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ENGLISH CLASSICS
COW PER
H. T. GRIFFITH


VOL. II.


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ACMILbon
MACMILLAN AND CO.


PUBLISHERS TO THE UNIVERSITY OF
Oxfort




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COWPER
THE TASK
WITH TIROCINIUM, AND SELECTIONS FROM THE
MINOR POEMS, A.D. 1784-1799
EDITED
WITH LIFE AND NOTES
BY
HENRY    THOMAS      GRIFFITH, B.A.
Vicar of Felmingham, Norfolk
Formerly Scholar of Pembroke College, Oxford
VOL. II
Second Edition
~ fipob
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
MDCCCLXXV


[All rights reserved]




C  I4l~

-    ". 7-1, i C4,




CONTENTS.
PAGE
Life of William Cowper......  vii
Chronological Table..... xlv
THE TASK (July 1783 to August 1784)
I. THE SOFA........   3
II. THE TIME-PIECE......  25
III. THE GARDEN......  48
IV. THE WINTER EVENING....  71
V. THE WINTER MORNING WALK...  93
VI. THE WINTER WALK AT NOON... I8
TIROCINIUM (November 1784).... 147
MINOR POEMS (1784-1799)
EPISTLE TO J. HILL, ESQ. (November 1784) 1. 75
ODE TO APOLLO....... 177
THE FAITHFUL BIRD...... 178
PAIRING TIME ANTICIPATED. 179
THE NEEDLESS ALARM.... 18
THE YEARLY DISTRESS (ante 1786)..  84
GRATITUDE (I786)......  87




vi


CONTENTS.


MINOR POEMS (continued)
THE POET'S NEW YEAR'S GIFT (January 1788)
THE NEGRO'S COMPLAINT (March 1788)
PITY FOR POOR AFRICANS.....
THE MORNING DREAM
ON MRS. MONTAGU'S FEATHER HANGINGS (June
1788)....
THE DOG AND THE WATER LILY (June 1788).
ON THE DEATH OF MRS. THROCKMORTON'S
BULLFINCH (September 1788)
ON THE RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE
OUT OF NORFOLK (February 1790)
THE JUDGMENT OF THE POETS (May 1791)
YARDLEY OAK (1791)......
THE RETIRED CAT (1791).
EPITAPH ON A FREE BUT TAME REDBREAST
(March 1792).......
To MRS. UNWIN (March 1793)..
A TALE (June 1793)
To MARY (I793).........
THE CASTAWAY (March 1799)..
NOTES.......


i88
i89
191
192
I94
I96
197
199
203
204
208
212
2 13
213
216
218
223




LIFE OF WILLIAM COWPER.
A.D. I731-i800.
WILLIAM COWPER was born on the 1 5th of November
(O. S.; Nov. 26, N. S.) I73i, at Great Berkhampstead, in
Hertfordshire. His father, the Rev. John Cowper, D.D.,
the Rector of that parish, and a Chaplain to King George 11,
was the second son of Spencer Cowper, a Judge of the
Common Pleas, whose elder brother William became Lord
Chancellor in 1707, and was created Earl Cowper in 17i8.
Dr. Cowper took to wife Anne, daughter of Roger Donne,
Esq., of Ludham Hall in Norfolk; of the same family as Dr.
John Donne, the famous poet and Dean of St. Paul's.
William was one of six children, of whom only himself and
his youngest brother John grew up to manhood. The birth
of the latter cost the life of his mother; who died Nov. I3,
1737, at the age of thirty-four.  After the lapse of fortyseven years, Cowper wrote to his friend Hill: ' I can truly say,
that not a week passes (perhaps I might with equal veracity
say a day) in which I do not think of her. Such was the
impression her tenderness made upon me, though the opportunity she had for showing it was so short.' The Poet
pleased himself with thinking that he bore a nearer resemblance, both in mind and body, to his mother's family,
than to that of his father. On the receipt of that Picture of
his Mother, which drew from him some of the most touching
lines to be found in any language, he wrote thus to his cousin




riii              LIFE OF COWPER.
Mrs. Bodham, in 1790: 'There is in me, I believe, more of
the Donne than of the Cowper; and though I love all of both
names, and have a thousand reasons to love those of my own
name, yet I feel the bond of nature draw me vehemently to
your side. I was thought in the days of my childhood much
to resemble my mother; and in my natural temper, of which
at the age of fifty-eight I must be supposed to be a competent
judge, can trace both her and my late uncle, your father.
Somewhat of his irritability; and a little, I would hope, of his
and of her -, I know not what to call it, without seeming
to praise myself, which is not my intention; but speaking to
you, I will even speak out, and say good nature.'
There can be little doubt, that Cowper inherited from his
mother much of that sensibility of nerve and delicacy of
sentiment, which proved the source of so great unhappiness
to him in the next scene on which he entered.
At the age of six years he was 'taken from the nursery'
and sent to a large boarding-school, kept by Dr. Pitman, at
Market Street, a town on the border-line of Hertfordshire
and Bedfordshire. At this school, during two years, he found
'hardships of various kinds to conflict with'; nor can this statement surprise any one, who considers the sensitive nature and
the retiring habits of the child. ' I was,' he tells us, singled out
from all the other boys, by a lad of about fifteen years of age,
as a proper object upon whom he might let loose the cruelty
of his temper. His savage treatment of me impressed such a
dread of his figure upon my mind, that I well remember being
afraid to lift my eyes upon him higher than his knees; and
that I knew him better by his shoe-buckles than by any other
part of his dress.'
In 1739 the child was removed from Dr. Pitman's school
on account of an inflammation in the eyes, accompanied with
specks on both, which threatened to cover them.' He was
in consequence placed for two years in the house of Mrs,
Disney, a female oculist. From her treatment he gained only
slight relief; but  at the age of fourteen the small-pot
seized him, and proved the better oculist of the two, as it




A T WESTMINSTER, 1741-8.


ix


removed the specks entirely.' He was, however, troubled
with a weakness in the eyes more or less throughout life; and
the affection was perhaps congenital, for he wrote to Hill
in Nov. 1782, 'My eyes are, in general, better than I remember them to have been since I first opened them upon
this sublunary stage, which is now a little more than half a
century ago.'
In 174i, being a boy of ten years, Cowper was entered at
Westminster School, then under the rule of Dr. Nichols.
Here he spent seven of the happiest years of his life. In
spite of his natural diffidence, and gentleness of manners, he
became popular alike with his Masters and his school-fellows.
With the former he earned a reputation for scholarship; and
amongst the latter he 'acquired fame by his achievements'
in cricket and football, and those other sports by which boys
are apt to gauge the courage and spirit of their companions.
Nearly forty years after he left school, he wrote to Unwin
(I786), 'I was a schoolboy in high favour with my master,
received a silver groat for my exercise, and had the pleasure
of seeing it sent from form to form for the admiration of all
who were able to understand it.' No wonder that we find
him saying, in the same letter, 'He who cannot look forward
with comfort, must find what comfort he can in looking backward. Upon this principle I the other day sent my imagination
upon a trip thirty years behind me. She was very obedient,
and at last set me down in the sixth form at Westminster.
I fancied myself once more a schoolboy,-a period of life in
which, if I had never tasted real happiness, I was at least
equally unacquainted with its contrary.' And no wonder that
even in his ' Tirocinium' he should dwell on
'The fond attachment to the well-known place
Where first we started into life's long race.'
It is clear therefore that the strong opinion which Cowper
afterwards formed against the public-school system, and to
which he gave so energetic an expression in the poem cited,
was not the result of unhappiness in his personal experience




x


LIFE OF COWPER.


of school life. Still less are we justified in tracing, as some
have traced, the malady which was ere long to overcloud his
intellects, to any misery endured in his boyhood, either at
Westminster, or at Market Street.
Our embryo Poet was not the only one amongst his
contemporaries at Westminster who was destined to play a
conspicuous part in the drama of life. He was there amidst
a galaxy of genius and wit, whose 'bright particular stars'
were in due course to shed their lustre over the world of
literature or politics; though the light cast by some of them
was lurid, and their influence baleful. Not to speak of Vincent
Bourne, who was Cowper's form-master, and whose graceful
Latin poems his pupil rendered into not less graceful English;
there were Robert Lloyd, Charles Churchill, Richard Cumberland, George Colman ' the elder,' Bonnell Thornton, Elijah
Impey, and Warren Hastings.   Yet of these men, all of
whom evinced powers that have rendered their names more
or less well known at this day, he who will live the longest
in the grateful affections of his fellow-countrymen is William
Cowper.
When the schoolboy reached his eighteenth year, it became
necessary that his father should decide on a profession for
him. Family traditions and family influence pointed naturally
to the Law. Accordingly, while Cowper was yet at Westminster, his name was entered at the Middle Temple, April
29, 1748. He left school soon afterwards, and resided with
his father at Berkhampstead for nine months; after which he
was articled for three years to Mr. Chapman, an attorney in
Ely Place, Holborn, that he might be acquiring a knowledge
of legal processes whilst keeping his terms. Here he made
little or no progress in the study of the Law, notwithstanding
the advantages placed within his reach by constant association
with his fellow-clerk in the office, Edward, afterwards Lord
Thurlow. The fact was, that Cowper paid too little attention
to his profession, for which indeed he had no natural taste,
and too much to his fair cousins in Southampton Row.
These were the daughters of Mr. Ashley Cowper, his father's




AT THE TEMPLE, 1752-4.


xi


younger brother, and afterwards Clerk of the Parliament; at
whose house the young law-student passed all his Sundays,
and was soon found spending also 'his leisure hours, which
were wellnigh all his time.' Harriet, the eldest of the three
cousins, afterwards Lady Hesketh, was the friend and correspondent of Cowper throughout his later years; and to her
next sister, Theodora Jane, he became bound by still tenderer
ties. In a word, an attachment sprang up between them;
and the double attractions of love and family affection made
the house the constant resort of the young poet. For a poet
he was by this time; although the love-ditties addressed to
his 'Delia' (of which the first that remains is dated 1752)
afford but slight presage of the powers afterwards developed
in him. He frequently took Thurlow with him to his uncle's
house; and the story of those days may be best summed up
in his own words to Lady Hesketh, 'I did actually live three
years with Mr. Chapman, that is to say, I slept three years at
his house; but 1 lived, that is to say, I spent my days, in
Southampton Row, as you very well remember. There was
I, and the future Lord Chancellor, constantly employed, from
morning to night, in giggling and making giggle, instead of
studying the Law. O fie, cousin! how could you do so?'
It was, however, not at this house, but on meeting Thurlow
in Bloomsbury Square, in the year I762, that Cowper said
to him, 'Thurlow, I am nobody, and shall always be nobody;
and you will be Lord Chancellor. You shall provide for me
when you are.' 'I surely will,' replied Thurlow, with a smile.
'These ladies,' pursued Cowper, 'are witnesses.' 'Let them
be so,' was Thurlow's answer, 'for I will certainly do it.'
This prediction was fulfilled in 1778; the promise, never.
In 1752, having attained his majority, Cowper quitted Mr.
Chapman's office, and hired chambers in the Middle Temple;
and on the I4th of June, I754, he was called to the Bar. It
seems to have been about this time that he first came under
the power of that tendency to depression of spirits, to which
other members of his family had been subject, but which
assumed in his case so fearful a form. In an Epistle to Lloyd,




Xli


LIFE OF COWPER.


written in 1754, we find him speaking of 'a fierce banditti' of
'gloomy thoughts,''That with a black infernal train,
Make cruel inroads in my brain,
And daily threaten to drive thence
My little garrison of sense.'
'I was struck,' he writes, ' not long after my settlement in
the Temple, with such a dejection of spirits, as none but they
who have felt the same can have the least conception of.
Day and night I was upon the rack, lying down in horror,
and rising up in despair.'
The origin of this distressing malady has been sought in the
grief felt by a child of six years, for the death of his mother;
and again, in the ill usage which he suffered at his first school.
But we have seen that this did not prevent his being thoroughly
happy during his seven years at Westminster.
Some of his biographers detect in the schoolboy premonitory
symptoms of the malady in the man, in the fact (related by
himself) that at one time, ' surveying his activity and strength,
and noticing the evenness of his pulse, he began to entertain
a notion that perhaps he might never die;' while 'soon after,
he had frequent intimations of a consumptive habit, which
perfectly convinced him that he was mortal.' All boys of a
highly imaginative mind, such as Cowper's was from his
earliest years, and who, like him, are driven through a diffident and retiring nature, into habits of communing with self,
are apt to entertain fancies of this sort. The Poet himself
assures us that a tendency to lowness of spirits was observable
in his family; and there can be little doubt that in himself
it was constitutional. His nature was one that ever craved
sympathy and affection; and it is probable that the sense of
isolation which falls as a dead weight upon a youth of this
disposition, on 'becoming in a manner completely master of
himself,' and beginning life on his own account in lonely
chambers, fostered a melancholy which was already his by
inheritance. Had he taken any real interest in his profession,




AT THE TEMPLE, I 754-6.


MR

and applied himself conscientiously to the mastery of its
details, this morbid development might perhaps have been
averted, or at least postponed. Cowper's intellect was indeed
too vigorous to admit of utter inaction; but it was at this
time exercised not on the mysteries of Law, but on classical
literature; of which he wrote to Mr. Newton, in I78i, '1
valued a man according to his proficiency and taste in it; and
had the meanest opinion of all other accomplishments unaccompanied by that.'
It has been imagined that the frustration of Cowper's hopes
of marrying his cousin Theodora, was the occasion of this
seizure. The truth seems to be, that this was the result
rather than the cause of his illness. Mr. Ashley Cowper, on
observing the growing attachment between the cousins, had
offered his objections; first, on the score of his nephew's lack
of means; and next, on account of the consanguinity between
the two. His own experience had convinced him of the family
taint; and he had probably viewed with alarm indications of
its existence in Cowper, which might have eluded an observation less sharpened by such previous knowledge, and by
parental solicitude for his daughter's future happiness. He
firmly refused his assent to the union; and on removing from
Southampton Row to Palace Yard, he closed his doors to his
nephew. This decision was accepted on both sides as final.
The last of Cowper's addresses to ' Delia' is dated in I755;
and his poem on ' Disappointment,' in which he takes his farewell of her, probably belongs to that year, or to 1756. They
never met afterwards; nor is there any evidence to shew that
Cowper's nature had been so deeply moved by his passion, as
to be injuriously affected by this sudden termination of his
courtship. It may however be remarked, that he stands
almost alone amongst poets, in making no allusion to the
passion of love. Some years after this separation, he wrote
to Lady Hesketh: ' I still look back to the memory of your
sister, and regret her: but, how strange it is, if we were
to meet now, we should not know each other!' When he
became dependent on his family, an > anonymous friend,




X1Y


LIFE OF CO WPER.


described as ' a person who loved him tenderly,' wrote to say
that ' whatever reduction of his income might happen, should
be supplied to him.' Yet his heart does not seem to have
suggested to him the writer's name. From time to time presents reached him from the same anonymous hand; sometimes in money, sometimes in the form of elegant toys such
as bachelors love. Now it was a desk; and now a snuff-box,
bearing on its lid a representation of 'The Peasant's Nest,'
with three leverets sporting in front of it. Strange, that it
should not have occurred to the mind of a Poet, that the
anonymous donor might possibly have been found to be-not
a man, but a woman! Far otherwise was it with Theodora.
She had laid up her cousin in the recesses of her heart, and
could find no room there for another.
'Fixed in her choice, and faithful-but in vain,'
she died unmarried in i825; and not till then were those
early effusions of Cowper's love to her, which she had hoarded
amongst her treasures, given to the world.,From his first attack of melancholy in the Temple, Cowper
was restored by a visit to Southampton. He walked out
one day with some friends to Freemantle, a place about a mile
distant; the morning being calm and clear, and the sun
pouring his golden sheen over the sea and the glades of the
New Forest. 'Here it was,' he relates, 'that on a sudden,
as if another sun had been kindled that instant in the heavens,
on purpose to dispel sorrow and vexation of spirit, I felt the
weight of all my misery taken off; my heart became light and
joyful in a moment; I could have wept with transport had I
been alone.' So keenly did his poetical sensibilities respond
to the magic touch of Nature.
The year 1756 was marked by the death of Dr. John
Cowper, which took place on the 3rd of August. He had
married a second wife, and there had never been much
intercourse between him and his son. On this occasion the
Poet paid his last visit to his native place. He then 'sighed
a long adieu to fields and woods; and was at no time so sen



AT THE TEMPLE, 1756-63.


xv


sible of their beauties, as just when he left them all behind
him, to return no more.' For, little as he had been at home,
'there was neither tree, nor gate, nor stile in all the country,
to which he did not feel a relation; and the house he preferred
to a palace.'
In 1759 Cowper removed from the Middle to the Inner
Temple. On his return to London after his sojourn at
Southampton, being under the persuasion that he was indebted for his recovery mainly to change of scene, he had
betaken himself to 'a continued circle of diversions.' These
were principally of a literary character. Cowper had inherited
the poetical talent.  His father, his uncle Ashley, his aunt
Mrs. Madan, and his brother John, were all writers of verses.
So was his ancestor Sir William Cowper, the first Baronet of
the family; whose verses composed for the monument erected
by himself to 'his spiritual father,' the Judicious Hooker, in
i634, are printed by Izaak Walton in his Life of that Divine.
Cowper tells us that he was himself 'a dabbler in rhymes' at
the age of fourteen, when he wrote a translation of an elegy
of Tibullus, which has not come down to us. The earliest of
his poems that we possess was composed in his seventeenth
year; being 'Verses written at Bath on finding the heel of a
shoe in I748,' in imitation of Phillips' 'Splendid Shilling'; and a
version of the 137th Psalm is also assigned to his Westminster
days. Whilst at the Temple, Cowper was a member of the
' Nonsense Club.' This was composed of seven Westminster
men, who dined together every Thursday, and amused themselves with literary bagatelles.  Here he renewed his connexion with his old schoolfellows Churchill, Colman, Lloyd,
and Bonnell Thornton; and here he formed a life-long
friendship with Joseph Hill, that
'honest man, close button'd to the chin,
Broadcloth without, and a warm heart within.'
With Colman and Thornton, Cowper now entered into
literary engagements. Whilst yet at Christ Church, they had
started a weekly periodical, called ' The Connoisseur;' and to
the second volume of this, published in 1756, Cowper contri



Xv1


LIFE OF COWPER.


buted a few papers, such as ' The Character of the Delicate
Billy Suckling' (No. i i i); 'A Letter from Christopher Ironsides, an old Bachelor, complaining of indignities from the
Ladies' (No. I 5); 'Of Keeping a Secret' (No. ii9); 'An
Account of the present state of Country Churches, their
Clergy, and Congregations' (No. 134); and one on a subject
which he afterwards treated poetically, namely 'Conversation'
(No. I38). He also sent some articles to the 'St. James'
Chronicle,' a newspaper conducted in part by the same two
friends. He translated four out of eight books of Voltaire's
Henriade, for his brother John; and the joint production
appeared in a magazine in 1759. He assisted the Duncombes
in their translations of Horace; and (as he informed Mr.
Newton in 178i) 'while at the Temple, he produced several
halfpenny ballads, two or three of which had the honour to
be popular.'
From this kind of occupation, however, Cowper derived
more pleasure than profit. He had come into a very small
sum of money at his father's death; and that little was daily
becoming less. He held no briefs; and up to this time his
family interest had only availed to procure for him (in 1759)
a Commissionership of Bankrupts, with a salary of ~6o a year.
He noticed the diminution of his little patrimony with a
certain vague uneasiness of mind. For some time he affected
to make light of the matter, declaring to his fellow-Templar,
Rowley, that ' if he never sank below that degree of poverty,
in which a man enjoys clean linen and good company, he
cared not if he never rose above it.' But Cowper's mind was
not one that could succeed in muffling its real anxieties
beneath the cloak of assumed gaiety.  He was becoming
more and more alarmed at the prospect before him, when an
event occurred which seemed to open a way of escape out of
his difficulties.
In 1763 the Clerk of the Journals of the House of Lords
died; and about the same time the posts of Reading Clerk,
and Clerk of Committees, became vacant. All three were
patent offices, in the patronage of Major Cowper; who




AT THE TEMPLE, 1756-63.


xvii


immediately offered the two last, which were the most
lucrative, to his cousin.  Cowper accepted the offer: but
no sooner had he done so, than his inveterate diffidence
induced a dread of an official position, to which the publicity
from which he shrank was of necessity attached. Yet he had
always looked forward to the reversion of these offices; and
had even remarked lightly, that he should be glad when
the holder of them was dead, that he might step into the
vacant place. And now these words returned to his horrified
conscience, as having been uttered ' in the spirit of a murderer.'
After much mental conflict, he begged Major Cowper to let
him exchange these more profitable posts for the Clerkship
of the Journals, the duties of which were performed in private.
But a fresh difficulty arose, which Cowper was powerless
to surmount. Objections were raised to the Major's right
of presentation; and an order was issued that his nominee
should be examined at the bar of the House, as to his qualifications for the office. This dreadful anticipation was too
much for the nerves of the sensitive man, already overwrought
by his previous agitation. 'A thunderbolt,' he says, ' would
have been as welcome to me as this announcement.' Though
time was allowed him for preparation, he toiled in vain to
make himself master of his new duties, by the study of the
Journals.  ' The feelings,' he adds, 'of a man when he
arrives at the place of execution are probably much like
mine every time I set my foot in the office, which was every
day for more than half a year together.' Moreover he ' was
not in a condition to receive instruction, much less to elicit it
out of manuscripts without direction.' Yet if he should throw
up the appointment, he would not merely be ' casting away
the only chance he had of being well provided for,' but
would be virtually ceding his cousin's right of nomination.
He fled to Margate during the vacation, and for a time was
restored to cheerfulness. But as the hour drew near when
he must undergo the dreaded ordeal, his terrors returned
with redoubled force. 'They,' he says, 'whose spirits are
formed like mine,-to whom a public exhibition of themselves


VOL. II.


b




XViii


LIFE OF COWPER.


on any occasion is mortal poison, may have some idea of
the horror of my situation: others can have none.' It was
to no purpose that he consulted the 'virtuous and faithful
Heberden:'-' quiet forsook him by day, and peace by night.'
He longed for madness, as his only chance of escape.  It
came; and in his madness he strove to kill himself. In
eac4 successive attempt he found himself unexpectedly foiled:
until at last he was startled into a conviction of the guilt of
the act, which he had so often ineffectually set himself to perpetrate. But this sense of guilt proves more maddening than
all besides. He is convinced that he is a reprobate, that he
has committed the unpardonable sin. At length his friends
were compelled to take the only course that seemed open to
them; and they removed him to a private asylum at St.
Alban's, kept by Dr. Nathaniel Cotton.
Cowper entered Dr. Cotton's house on the 7th of December,
1763. For the first five months his intellects seemed to be
utterly destroyed. Gradually, however, the soothing influence
of daily converse with a man of cultivated mind, refined
feelings, literary tastes, and strong Christian principles, produced a change for the better.   In July, 1764, Cowper
received a visit from his brother John. When the latter
heard the sufferer repeat his 'settled assurance of sudden
judgment,' he quietly told him that it was all a 'delusion.'
The words were caught up with eagerness. 'I burst into
tears,' writes Cowper, and cried out "If it be a delusion,
then am I the happiest of beings." Something like a ray of
hope was shot into my heart.'  He opened his Bible, long
since flung aside as a book in which a doomed man like him
had no interest. The first verse that met his eye was Romans
iii. 25: 'Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation
through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the
remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of
God.' 'Immediately,' proceeds Cowper, ' I received strength
to believe, and the full beams of the Sun of Righteousness fell
upon me.'   And now all was joy and peace. The excellent
and judicions Dr. Cotton did what he could to moderate the




AT ST. ALBANS, 1763-5.


xix


ecstasies of the young convert; tending him not simply with
the skill of a practised psychologist, but with the sympathy of
a brother in Christ.  Well might Cowper write to Lady
Hesketh, 'I reckon it one instance of the Providence that
has attended me.. that I was carried to Dr. Cotton. I was
not only treated by him with the greatest tenderness while I
was ill, and attended with the utmost diligence; but when my
reason was restored to me, and I had so much need of a religious friend to converse with, to whom I could open my
mind upon the subject without reserve, I could hardly have
found a fitter person for the purpose.' And well did the
Physician deserve that the Poet should make for him a niche
in the temple of Fame, by the grateful allusion to the former
in the poem on Hope, as
Cotton, whose humanity sheds rays,
That make superior skill his second praise.'
In days gone by it was no uncommon thing to hear it said
that it was religion which drove poor Cowper mad. It is
much nearer the truth to say that it was religion which restored him from madness. Long before his morbid tendencies
led him to this deplorable point, there was that in religion
which touched a chord in his susceptible nature, whose music
soothed him in agitation of mind. When at school at
Market Street, he tells us, 'one day as he sat melancholy and
almost ready to weep,' expecting his tormentor every moment,
the words of the Psalmist came into his mind, 'I will not fear
what flesh can do unto me.' 'I then applied them,' he adds,
'to my own case, and instantly perceived in myself a briskness
of spirit and a cheerfulness I had never before experienced.'
Again, on his first attack in the Temple, he met with the poems
of George Herbert: and 'though he found not there a cure
for his malady, yet it never seemed so much alleviated as
while he was reading him.' And about the same time he
composed a set of prayers, and found great comfort in the
frequent use of them.
Though fully restored to health Cowper remained as awn
b 2




XX


LIFE OF COWPER.


inmate of Dr. Cotton's house till the end of eighteen months;
and on the 22nd of June, 1765, he proceeded to Huntingdon.
This place had been selected for him, as being within easy
reach of Cambridge, where his brother was residing on his
Fellowship at Bene't College. A few weeks after his arrival,
a young man fresh from Cambridge sought out the recluse in
his lonely lodgings. This was William Cawthorne Unwin,
'a most unreserved and amiable young man, known almost
as soon as seen,' and 'sincere in his belief and love of the
Gospel.'  He introduced Cowper to his family, which the
latter found to be 'altogether the cheerfullest afid most
engaging family it is possible to conceive.' There was the
father, Morley Unwin, the non-resident Rector of Grimston
in Norfolk, 'a man of learning and good sense, and as simple
as Parson Adams.' There was the sister, a young lady of
eighteen, 'rather handsome and genteel,' who became the
wife of the Rev. Matthew Powley, afterwards Vicar of
Dewsbury in Yorkshire. And there was the mother, Mary
Unwin, whose name will never die whilst Cowper's lives: she,
who was destined to be to him ' often a nurse, and invariably
the kindest friend through a thousand adversities, that he had
to grapple with in the course of thirty years.' She ' had a very
uncommon understanding, had read much to excellent purpose, and was more polite than a Duchess;' and better than
all, Cowper found that they 'had one faith, and had been
baptized with the same baptism.' At Huntingdon Cowper
not only enjoyed familiar intercourse with these delightful
people, but had the further advantage of regular bathing in the
Ouse, and of frequent horse exercise; as visits were exchanged
weekly between the brothers at Huntingdon and Cambridge,
a distance of fifteen miles. All this did so much for the reestablishment of Cowper's health and spirits, that he wrote to
the Major, Oct. i8, 1765, ' It is impossible I could have fixed
upon a place so agreeable to me in all respects. I am much
happier than the day is long, and sunshine and candlelight see
me perfectly contented. I enjoy better health than for many
years past.'




AT HUNTINGDON, 176;5-7.


Xx1


In less than a month later, this happiness was increased
by Cowper's becoming a permanent resident in the house
of the Unwins. He took the place just vacated by one of
Mr. Unwin's pupils, and was received as a lodger and boarder
with the family, Nov. i i, 1 765. With these dear friends he
led a life of much regularity, in which however he was
conscious of no monotony, in the enjoyment of those domestic
pleasures which his nature specially fitted him to appreciate,
but from which circumstances had hitherto combined to exclude him. Such a home was what he had for many years
ardently desired; for he was of
'An unambitious mind, that early felt
A wish for ease and leisure;'
and though that blessing was long denied to him, yet at length,
at the age of thirty-four, he
' Found here that leisure and that ease he wish'd.'
A regular attendance at the daily prayers in the parish church,
and much devotional reading and conversation during each
day at home, were prevented from causing fatigue to the mind
by a not less regular practice of taking exercise twice a day;
the evening walk being seldom under four miles. Thus too
the return of anxiety arising from pecuniary embarrassments
was fended off. Such anxiety was impending; for not only
was Cowper ' deeply in debt' to Dr. Cotton, but his resources
were reduced by the resignation of the Commissionership of
Bankrupts, in 1765. He had thus become almost wholly dependent upon his relatives, who showed themselves both
prompt and delicate in contributing to his support; and he
now found that his limited means went farther at Mr. Unwin's
house, than in his own lodgings, where in three months, ' by
the help of good management, and a clear notion of economy,
he contrived to spend the income of a twelvemonth.'
After eighteen months of peace and tranquillity, the home
at Huntingdon was broken up by the death of Mr. Unwin,
in June, 1767. This event rendered it necessary that the
widow and her lodger-towards whom 'her behaviour had
always been that of a mother to a son'-should seek for




xx1i


LIFE OF COWPER.


themselves a new home.   Mr. Unwin had expressed his
wish that, in case of his death, Mr. Cowper might continue
to dwell with his widow. With both it was an essential
point, that they should remove to some spot at which they
might be under the faithful preaching of the gospel, in the
form in which they had received it. While the question was
in debate a visitor arrived, who had been requested to call
on them by Dr. Conyers, a Cambridge friend of young Unwin,
and who is commemorated in the poem on Truth, as one who
' says much that many may dispute
And cavil at with ease, but none refute.'
This was the Rev. John Newton. It was soon arranged that
they should take up their new abode at Olney, in Buckinghamshire; a parish to which Mr. Newton had been appointed as
Curate in i764.
It was on the I4th of September, 1767, that Cowper left
Huntingdon, with Mrs. Unwin, for the vicarage at Olney;.where they passed the first three months. On the 9th of
December they removed to Orchard Side, a house situate in
the Market-place of Olney: but so near to the vicarage,
that by opening a door in each garden wall, and crossing an
orchard, the inmates of the one house could make their way
to the other without passing through the street.
It may be doubted whether Cowper could have found
a place less eligible for a man subject to depression of spirits,
than Olney. The country around was flat and marshy, and
liable to inundations from the Ouse throughout the winter
months; so much so, that the whole valley between Olney
and Emberton was frequently under water. Thus the wooden
bridge alluded to at the opening of ' The Winter Evening' as
'bestriding the wintry flood,' was as ' needful' as it was
'lengthy.' And the town also was dullness itself, with its
'One parson, one poet, one bellman, one crier.'
Its inhabitants, all poor and all sickly, were engaged in lacemaking and straw-plaiting; there were no resident gentry save




AT OLNEY, 1767-70.


XXlll


Mr. Newton and ' Sir Cowper,' as he was deferentially termed
by his humble neighbours;
' And the poor Poet was the only Squire.'
Cowper missed the regular exercise he had enjoyed at
Huntingdon. He no longer kept a horse; and the condition
of the roads was not favourable for walking. In a letter to
Mr. Newton (Aug. 5, i786) he speaks of the C long confinement in the winter, and indeed for the most part in the
autumn too,' as having seriously hurt him; and he adds,
'A gravel walk thirty yards long affords but indifferent scope
to the locomotive tendency: yet it is all that we have had to
move in for eight months in the year, during thirteen years
that I have been a prisoner. Had I been confined in the
Tower, the battlements of it would have furnished me with
a larger space.' Meanwhile Cowper's intercourse with Mr.
Newton was close and affectionate-too close, perhaps, for
his health.  They 'made it a rule to pass four days in the
week together;' dining at one o'clock, taking tea at four,
and from six till supper-time engaging in ' service or lecture
or something of that kind.' Mr. Newton himself says, that
'for six years they were seldom separate, when at home and
awake.' A man of far stronger constitution than Cowper's
could hardly fail to become sensible of much mental fatigue,
from such intense and exclusive converse with a single mind;
even though that mind were Mr. Newton's. ' Moreover
Cowper spent much of his time in visiting the poor, ministering to the sick, and praying at the bedside of the dying;
so that (in the words of Mr. Cecil) 'Mr. Newton used
to consider him as a sort of curate, from his constant attendance upon the sick and afflicted in that large and
necessitous parish.' This occupation, at all times an arduous
and discouraging one, even to the pastor who has deliberately
devoted himself to the work, must have been peculiarly so
to a man of Cowper's highly sensitive organization. But
this was not the worst.  Mr Newton held frequent prayermeetings in his parish; and Cowper was encouraged, if not




xxiv


LIFE OF CO WPER.


required, to lead the devotions on these occasions.  Mr.
Greatheed tells us in his funeral sermon, 'I have heard him
say, that when he expected to take the lead in social worship,
his mind was always greatly agitated for some hours preceding, owing to that timidity which, he invariably felt at
every appearance before his fellow-creatures.' It might be
true that 'his trepidation subsided as soon as he began to
speak in prayer;' but was it well that nerves so finely strung
should be subjected to such a strain?
In the midst of labours tending so much alike to spiritual
excitement and physical exhaustion. Cowper lost his only
brother, to whose memory he has paid so loving a tribute in
'The Time-Piece' (11.780-95). This event took place on March
20, 1770; and although Cowper had the satisfaction of
knowing that his brother, in his last illness, embraced his
own views of saving grace, the shock was one that severely
tried his affectionate nature.  At length Mr. Newton was
struck with the increasing gloom that was enveloping his
friend. However injudicious we may think the course which
the former had pursued in his character of Cowper's spiritual
director, none can question the reality and fulness of his
affection.  The constitution of Mr. Newton presented a
singular contrast to that of the other, both in body and
mind. The old sea-captain knew nothing of physical fatigue;
the old slaver could little appreciate the squeamish susceptibilities of refined sentiment. ' With limbs of British oak
and nerves of wire,' with an unflagging zeal, and a will strong
if not coarse, he was ill fitted for the handling of so delicate
and complex a piece of mechanism as the mind of a Cowper.
By way of diverting the Poet's brooding thoughts, he projected
in 177I the preparation of the Olney Hymns.    Cowper
had written occasional hymns for him as early as 1767, and
now the friends set to work diligently for two years to produce
their joint collection.  The Hymns were not published
till Feb. 15, 1779. They were 348 in number; and of these
67 were distinguished as Cowper's by the initial C. It may be
that some lovers of Hymnology are not aware, that amongst




A T OLNEY, 1770-3v


xxv


these are to be found their old favourites,-' God moves in a
mysterious way '; ' Hark! my soul, it is the Lord '; ' Jesus,
where'er Thy people meet'; 'Oh for a closer walk with God';
'Sometimes a light surprises'; 'There is a fountain filled with
blood'; 'What various hindrances we meet.'
But why this long delay of eight years, before the publication of the Olney Hymns?   Alas! the old malady had
returned.  We have seen that the attack of 1763 had seized
Cowper about ten years after his first fit of melancholy in
the Temple. Another decade had now elapsed; and in
January, 1773, he was 'suddenly reduced (as he wrote in
1786) from his wonted rate of understanding, to an almost
childish imbecility. This state of mind was accompanied
with misapprehension of things and persons. He believed
that everybody hated him, and Mrs. Unwin most of all;
was convinced that all his food was poisoned; together with
ten thousand megrims of the same stamp.' Matters rapidly
grew worse with him. All the most distressing of the old
symptoms re-appeared in an aggravated form.  At first he
refused to go near the vicarage; and when at length induced
to enter it, he was equally resolved not to quit it. It was
not till August that Mr. Newton consulted Dr. Cotton, and
then it was too late. At the end of fourteen months passed
under Mr. Newton's roof, and during which the patient was
tended with the watchful assiduity of love by Mrs. Unwin,
he exhibited the first signs of recovery, by noticing the
growth of the trees and flowers in the garden. ' The first
smile for sixteen months' was seen on his countenance; and
he returned to Orchard Side. Here he resumed his residence
with Mrs. Unwin, on the old footing: though it should seem
that, but for this return of insanity, the tender tie between
the two would have been drawn (if possible) yet closer by
marriage. The truth of the current report to this effect
has been strenuously denied by the earlier biographers of
the Poet, with a sort of vehement indignation for which
it is not easy to discern any occasion.  But the positive
statements quoted by Mr. Benham (Globe edition, i870,




xxvi


LIFE OF COWPER.


p. xxxix) must be allowed as conclusive. ' Mr. Bull, in his
Memorials of Newton, declares that again and again he had
heard his father say, that they were about to be married
when Cowper's malady returned in 1773; and that Bull
knew this from Mrs. Unwin herself.' And then he adds the
following extract from Newton's hitherto unpublished Diary:
'They were congenial spirits, united in the faith and hope
of the gospel; and their intimate and growing friendship led
them, in the course of four or five years, to an engagement
of marriage, which was well known to me, and to most of
their and my friends, and was to have taken place in a few
months, but was prevented by the terrible malady which
seized him about that time.'  It is true that Mrs. Unwin
was at this time forty-eight years of age, and Cowper only
forty-one; yet it would probably have conduced to the
comfort of both, if this union could have been effected. But
what had now occurred was thought sufficient to render any
revival of the question impossible.
As Cowper slowly regained his mental powers, he began to
divert himself not only with his favourite pursuit of gardening,
but with carpentering and landscape-painting, and more particularly with keeping pet animals. In 1774 his three hares,
Puss, Tiney, and Bess, were given to him; and he furnished
an account of their treatment to the Gentleman's Magazine
for June, I784. Lady Hesketh has enumerated no fewer than
twenty domesticated animals which he had about him at one
time.  He amused himself also with the continuation of
that delightful series of letters to his friends, which had
been begun in the week of his arrival at Huntingdon; but
which had flagged, and in the case of Lady Hesketh had
ceased entirely, soon after his settlement at Olney.
The next change in the Poet's life was occasioned by
Mr. Newton's migration to London. He was presented by
Mr. John Thornton, in September, I779, to the united
Rectories of St. Mary Woolnoth and St. Mary Woolchurch
Haw; and he quitted Olney early in January, 1780. Before he
did so, his forethought for his friend's comfort suggested




AT OLNEY, 1774-8 1.


XXVll


his introduction to the Rev. William Bull, a congregational
minister at Newport Pagnell, five miles from Olney. He
was 'a Dissenter, but a liberal one: a man of letters and
of genius, and master of a fine imagination.'  The two were
drawn towards each other by a mutual attraction; dined
together once a fortnight; and became fast friends.
And now began a period of literary activity which proved
a most wholesome recreation to Cowper. He took delight
in throwing off poems on various subjects of public or private
interest. ' I have never,' he writes, 'found an amusement
among the many I have been obliged to have recourse to,
that so well answered the purpose for which I used it.  The
quieting and composing effect of it was such, and so totally
absorbed have I sometimes been in my rhyming occupation,
that neither the past nor the present (those themes which
to me are so fruitful in regret at other times) had any longer
a share in my contemplation.'  The clear sight of love was
keen to perceive the benefit which the convalescent derived
from this occupation; and Mrs. Unwin urged him to the
composition of a long poem worthy of his powers. He asked
for a subject, and she gave him ' The Progress of Error.'
The Poet addressed himself to the work in December, 1780;
and in three months produced not only the poem bearing
that name, but also ' Truth,' 'Table Talk,' and ' Expostulation.'
Mr. Newton's kind offices availed to secure their acceptance
by Johnson, a publisher in St. Paul's Churchyard; and the
poems were sent to him in April, I78m.  Johnson suggested
an addition to the volume: whereupon Cowper wrote ' Hope'
and ' Charity '; and to these he soon added ' Conversation' and
'Retirement.' A few minor pieces were included, and the
volume was published about the ist of March, 1782.  By
the author's request Mr. Newton wrote a preface to it; and
his name was to have appeared on the title'page as editor.
This preface, dated Feb. i8, 1782, was first prefixed to the
fifth edition, 1790; as the publisher feared that its distinctively Evangelical tone would injure the sale of the book., But ere the publication of this volume, a sunbeam had




XXVlll


LIFE OF COWPER.


glanced across the path of Cowper's social life, which for
a while lit up his whole existence with a brightness such as
had never before illumined it. In the summer of I781 he
formed the acquaintance of Lady Austen,-' a lively, agreeable
woman, who had seen much of the world, and accounted it a
great simpleton, as it is; one who laughed and made laugh,
and could keep up a conversation without seeming to labour
at it.' She was the widow of Sir Robert Austen, seventh
Baronet of Bexley in Kent; to whom she was married when
very young, and with whom she had lived entirely in France,
till his death in 1772. When Cowper met her, she was on
a visit to her sister, the wife of the Rev. J. Jones of Clifton
Reynes, one mile from Olney. She took tea there, and was as
much captivated by the person and genius of the Poet,
as he was fascinated by her gay and sympathetic manner.
Those were the days of picnics and parties of pleasure:
and before Lady Austen returned to London in October,
she had become ' Sister Anna,' and Cowper her ' Brother
William'; and a correspondence on these terms was arranged
between them. But in the ensuing February a disagreement
arose. Lady Austen appears to have found in Cowper less
reciprocity of sentiment than she expected; and the latter
wrote thus to Unwin, ' She expressed a sort of romantic idea
of our merits, and built such expectations of felicity upon our
friendship, as we were sure that nothing human could possibly
answer. I wrote to her to remind her that we were mortal,
to recommend it to her not to think more highly of us than
the subject would warrant.' 'This letter,' he continues,
'gave mortal offence. It received indeed an answer, but
such a one as I could by no means reply to: and there ended
-for it is impossible that it should be renewed-a friendship
that bid fair to be lasting.' The lady however viewed the
matter in a different light. In less than a fortnight, Cowper
received a present of three pair of ruffles from her; and the
least he could do was to send his thanks by Mr. Jones, and
transmit a copy of his Poems to Lady Austen. Shortly afterwards she repeated her visit to Clifton; when she threw




AT OLNEY, 1782-3.


xxix


herself with tears into Mrs. Unwin's arms, and soon put the
whole party at their ease.  In a few weeks she took lodgings
in the vicarage, with the design of fixing her abode at Olney;
and the occupants of the two dwellings became so closely
united as to form  almost one household.   'A  practice
obtained at length of dining with each other alternately every
day, Sundays excepted;' and beyond this, Cowper ' paid his
devoirs to her ladyship every morning at eleven.' The trio
formed a most harmonious and cheerful party, both at home
and in their walks into the country. Cowper wrote poems
for Lady Austen to sing to her harpsichord: among others,
that on the ' Loss of the Royal George' (Sept. 1782).  One
evening in October, perceiving her friend to be in more than
usually low spirits, she sought to enliven him by reciting the
story of John Gilpin, as one ' which had been told her in her
childhood.' After all had retired to rest, peals of laughter
were heard to issue from the Poet's chamber, so continuous
and hysterical as to alarm Mrs. Unwin for his reason.  The
next morning he presented the ladies with 'The Diverting
History of John Gilpin,' which he had spent the night in turning into verse.
The ballad was sent to Unwin, who got it printed in the
' Public Advertiser' of Nov. I4, I782; the author's consent to
this being guarded with one proviso,-auctore tantum anonymo.   The story could not fail to become popular.  Writing
to Unwin, May 8, I784 (eighteen months after its first appearance), Cowper tells him that the publisher had at first
objected to his design of adding it 'at the tail' of his new
volume of poems, on the ground of its being ' now too trite ';
inasmuch as it had been ' hacknied in every magazine, in
every newspaper, and in every street.' A fresh impulse was
given to the popularity of 'John Gilpin,' when (in 1785) Mr.
Richard Sharp, known as 'Conversation Sharp,' suggested to
John Henderson the Actor, that he should include it in his
series of Lenten recitations in Freemason's Hall. From that
time the verses became 'familiar in men's mouths as household words.'




xxx


LIFE OF COWPER.


It is not only for ' John Gilpin' that the world has to thank
Lady Austen.  But for her, we should have had no ' Task';
and Cowper would not have been selected for this Series, as
the representative poet of his age. The volume of I782,
though containing much that perhaps no man but Cowper
could have written, did not possess the elements of popularity, either in its subjects or the manner of their treatment.
If we compare the later poems of the series with 'The
progress of Error,' we shall indeed observe a marked improvement, both in the smoothness of the versification (which
is very conspicuous in ' Retirement') and in the more poetical
handling of the theme. ' Expostulation ' is a magnificent burst
of impassioned feeling, and may be said in some parts of it
to soar into sublimity. Yet, as Miss Seward has remarked,
' No reader could have expected the diamonds of Cowper,
who had only seen the Scotch pebbles which he offered for
sale at the beginning of his career.' Nevertheless the book
had attracted some favourable notice. Although the Critical
Review found in it nothing more than 'decent mediocrity,'
and pronounced it to be ' little better than a dull sermon in
very indifferent verse,' the London and Gentleman's Magazines, and the Monthly Review, ' the critical Rhadamanthus '
of the day, had bestowed on it decided, though not enthusiastic praise. Mr. John Thornton had sent a copy of it to
Benjamin Franklin, then American Ambassador in Paris;
and his 'plaudit' was very gratifying to the author. This
appreciation of his work by a stranger made him the more
sensitive to the neglect of his old friends, Colman and
Thurlow, neither of whom had the civility to acknowledge
the presentation-copies which he sent to them. He vented
his indignation with natural resentment in ' The Valediction,'
written in Nov. I783. In this year Mr. Bull sent Cowper
the poems of Madame de la Mothe Guion; and these, which
he thought 'the only French verse he ever read that he found
agreeable,' he translated in a month. Lady Austen pressed
him to write a new original poem in blank verse, which
Milton had taught her to love. When he replied that she




AT OLNEY, I783-4.


xxxi


must find a subject for him; she said, 'Oh! you can never
be in want of a subject; you can write on any,-write upon
this Sofa.' The 'task' thus imposed was accepted, and fulfilled-all the world knows how.
'The Sofa'was begun in June or July, 1783; and it was
'ended but not finished' on the 3rd of August. Five more
books followed; and the entire '\Task' was completed in
August or September, I784.  As a delay occurred in the
printing, Cowper appended to it a poem which he had finished
in the interim, and which he called 'Tirocinium, or a Review
of Schools.' And after much vacillation on the part of author
and publisher, the volume was made to include ' The History
of John Gilpin,' and was finally published in July, 1785.
The new poem was read and admired by everybody. It
were out of place to repeat what has been said in the Introduction to our first volume, as to the distinctive merits which
made The Task, and the man who executed it so ably,
spring forward at a bound into the forefront of literary popularity. Suffice it to say here, that it has been given to few
poets to rise so suddenly into the height of favour, and to
have maintained during so many successive generations the
rank thus achieved. Cowper met the want of his age; and
his countrymen were grateful to him for supplying their need.,
Men were, perhaps unconsciously to themselves, yearning for
a Poetry higher and nobler, more real and more human,
than what then went by that name amongst them. Cowper
wanted but to gain a hearing: that gained, he was sure to be
eagerly welcomed by thousands, who were wearied out with
the pretty but unmeaning trifles offered to their jaded imagination. It was a jeu d'esprit which procured for the Poet the
hearing that he wanted; a ballad,-not indeed really ephemeral as he deemed it, but of which he fancied that he ought
to feel himself a little ashamed, and the authorship of which
he long hesitated to acknowledge to the world. His new
volume was seized with avidity by the public, not as being the
production of the author of Table Talk, but out of a curiosity
to see something more from the hand of the man who could




**xi


LIFE OF COWPER.


write the History of John Gilpin. This curiosity was amply
rewarded, by the perusal of a noble poem, differing in its style
and subject from anything with which the readers of Cowper's
day were familiar; and appealing directly to the hearts and
sympathies of all classes of Englishmen. The Monthly Reviewer of the former volume had pronounced Cowper to be
' a poet s.ui generis'; and now these words were found to be
true, in a much wider sense than that in which they had been
intended. All who read-The Task felt that the time so long
desired had at length arrived, and that a new school of Poetry
was inaugurated. The Artificial School of Pope, and his mob
of servile imitators, had been succeeded by the Sentimental
School, of which Darwin and Hayley were the popular living
representatives. It was seen at a glance, that both of these
must be superseded, at once and for ever, by the new School
of Nature. The first, faultless in structure, and dazzling the
eye with its glitter, had been cold and ungenial as the Palace
of Ice on the Neva. The second, warm and voluptuous, but
too listless for passion, refined to languor, and essenced o'er
with the faint scent of delicate perfumes, was as unwholesome
and enervating as a hothouse filled with exotics, or as a
crowded drawing-room in the London season. The one was
not attuned to the sympathies of mankind at large; the other
could not respond to the demands of the masculine intellect.
The caterers of the Artificial School displayed on their polished
board choice porcelain services, of curious workmanship, with
cups of sparkling crystal, or of frosted silver; but the hungry
guest, after duly admiring the unexceptionable taste and high
finish of these accessories to a feast, looked round in vain for
the viands, wherewith his appetite might be appeased. Those
of the Sentimental School, bowing in their guest with the
blandest of smiles, lapped him in beds 'of roses, and lulled his
senses with clouds of aromatic incense, while, amid strains of
softest music, they banquetted him on sweetmeats. Then
uprose the trumpet note of a man as yet unknown, or known
to few; and in its sound, distinct and powerful, was manly
sympathy with human souls. From the hermit's cell at Olney




AT OLNEY, i783-4x


XXXll


emerged the Poet of the Country, to claim a place in the
kingdom of letters, which the Poet of the Town, long after
the term of his natural life, had continued to rule with absolute sovereignty. The Bard of Nature entered the lists with
the jingling rhymesters of Sentiment, and bore them down at
every point, so that their very names are now known only to
the curious. Thenceforward the names that should be the
greatest on the roll of modern English Poets must be those of
students in that School of Nature, of which Cowper was the
earliest graduate. Others coming after him were destined to
surpass him: but it must be by virtue of their being more
deeply versed than he in Nature's lore, and therefore more
fully furnished for the exposition of her mysteries of love and
beauty. A Wordsworth, a Coleridge, a Shelley, a Tennyson,
were to follow:-they must win their fame by advancing along
the track which Cowper had pointed out to them.
We ane not indeed to conclude that Cowper addressed
himself to the composition of ' The Task' with any conscious)
design of becoming the founder of a new school of Poetry.
On the contrary, what is most remarkable about this poem,
and what contributed not a little to its extraordinary success,
is the entire absence of design, or of any pre-conceived plan
whatever. The Poet seems to have set out without knowing
whither his steps would lead him, or what he was going to do.
There are indications in the opening of the first Book, that
Cowper had undertaken ' The Task' in the same spirit of
pleasantry in which Lady Austen had imposed it. He was to
write upon a Sofa: and he begins his treatment of the subject
in a mock-heroic style, as if he were highly amused at the
idea of having to write on so slight a theme, and were making
fun of it; playing with it as a giant might play with a doll.
The grandiloquent language in which he discourses, with an
assumed air of the most serious gravity, about his joint stools
and leathern elbow-chairs, serves rather to betray than to
conceal the laugh, with which he is, inwardly enjoying the
humour of the thing. There is all the air of intentional burlesque, in the frequent application of ' stock passages' out of


VOL. II.


C




xxxiv


LIFE OF COWPER.


Milton and Shakspeare; to which he gives such a turn of his
own, and which he introduces in so odd a connexion, that
his use of them amounts to a parody on the originals. But all
this is only at the outset; and after having 'played awhile
with his light task,' indulging his sportive vein through a
hundred lines or so, he strolls away on his country rambles,
and thinks no more of the Sofa. What he saw as he roved
along, what fruits he gathered by the way, what thoughts
sprang up in his mind as it ranged yet farther than his steps,
and what home joys awaited him on his return; —all this must
be heard from none but his own lips. Nothing can exceed
the ease, the simplicity, the genuine courtesy, the kindly garrulity, with which he converses with all who are willing to
walk by his side; and helps them to draw from the scenes he
loves the pleasure which they impart to himself, and to share
with him the emotions and reflections which they stir up in
his own mind. One thing indeed surprises us at first, as we
listen to his glowing descriptions of Nature, or his pungent
remarks on men and manners:-our charming companion,
with all his natural simplicity, is very fond of long words. We
look up into his face enquiringly, while he rolls out such
sonorous polysyllables as 'oscitancy,' 'vermicular,' ' vortiginous,' or 'stercoraceous'; and we have to ask ourselves
twice, what he means by his peculiar use of words otherwise
so familiar to us, as ' induce,' ' result,' ' solicit,' or ' voluble.'
But we remember that he has been a sixth-form boy in a
Public School; and that his later years have not brought him
into that practical contact with life in its business aspects,
which serves to wean men from their schoolboy fondness for
classical forms and idioms. And though we may have to suppress a yawn over his minute directions for the raising of
cucumbers, or suspect that a little more general knowledge,might have softened the severity of his strictures upon the
pioneers of Natural Science; still we confess with delight,
that out of the fulness of his mental stores he has spread a
rich feast before us, and that we have been seldom in the
company of one more genial in his bearing towards his guests,




AT OLNEY, 1783-4.


XXXV


or better qualified to entertain them with variety of agreeable
and instructive conversation.
We must return to Lady Austen. Before the publication
of 'The Task,' a rupture had again taken place between her
and the Olney couple. The cause of this final severance has
been much debated. The account which Cowper gave of it
to Unwin is not specific. 'We found the connexion,' he
writes, 'on some accounts an inconvenient one. The dissimilitude was too great not to be felt continually, and consequently made our intercourse unpleasant.'  To Lady
Hesketh the Poet complained, that he found his leisure for
study and composition sadly interrupted by his constant
attendance on Lady Austen; which, though at first optional,
c long usage had made a point of good manners, and consequently of necessity.' In short, he 'was forced to neglect
the "Task," to attend upon the Muse who had inspired the
subject.' Cowper had written of Lady Austen to Unwin,
July 29, 1781, ' She is a most agreeable woman, and has
fallen in love with your mother and me.' The most recent
disclosures all tend to the suggestion, that these words were
true (as far as he was himself concerned) in a far more
literal sense than the writer intended. Lady Austen showed
Hayley some verses which Cowper had addressed to her, and
which seemed to convey a proof to her-all too eager for
such proof-that he was really attached to her personally.
These verses-' To a Lady who wore a lock of his hair set
with diamonds'-were first printed by Mr. Benham, in I870.
In them the Poet sang'The heart that beats beneath that breast
Is William's, well I know;
A nobler prize and richer far
Than India could bestow.'
The woman who reads these lines will surely pardon Lady
Austen's misconception of their import. After all, Cowper
was not her 'brother William'; and he was 'past the bounds
of freakish youth.' A man in his fifty-fourth year might be
C 2




XXXVi


LIFE OF CO WPER.


supposed to have laid aside the hyperbolical rhapsodies which
might have meant nothing particular at half that age. But
however tender the language into which Cowper's indulgence
in sentiment betrayed him, he felt himself to be bound to
Mrs. Unwin by so many and such ties of gratitude and affection, that when it became a question whether he should give
up her, or Lady Austen, there was but one answer he could
give. He therefore wrote to the latter, as Hayley informs us,
that ' very tender yet resolute letter,' in which he ' explained
and lamented the circumstances that forced him to renounce
her society'; and which Lady Austen, ' in a moment of natural
mortification,' destroyed. It was in May, I784, that she took
her final leave of Olney. She was afterwards married to
M. de Tardiff, a scholar and a poet; and died in Paris,
August I 2, i802.
Lady Austen's loss was in some measure made up to the Poet
by a new friendship, which commenced in the same month.
Mr. John Courtenay Throckmorton, the ' Benevolus' of ' The
Task' (i. 262), had come into residence at Weston Underwood
two years before. He confirmed to Cowper the privilege of
using a private key of the park gates, which had been allowed
by the former occupant of the House (ibid. 1. 330): but the
Squire of Weston and the Poet of Olney did not meet till
May, 1784. Cowper and Mrs. Unwin then went by invitation
to witness the ascent of a balloon from Weston Park. A
week had scarcely elapsed ere they were on terms of easy
intimacy with the Throckmortons, which soon ripened into
a lasting friendship, notwithstanding that the latter were
Roman Catholics. After the publication of 'The Task,' other
friends came forward to assert their claim to stand in that
relation to its author. The various members of Cowper's
family, who had hitherto been satisfied with contributing to
the support of one whom they regarded as hopelessly incapacitated for the real business of life, became proud to
resume personal intercourse with a poet, whose fame now
rendered him an ornament to their house. His uncle Ashley,
and his old friend and patron the Major (now General




A T OLNEY, 1784-6.


xxxvll


Cowper), were of this number: and his cousin Harriet, left
a widow by the death of Sir Thomas Hesketh in 1778, renewed that interchange of letters which had been dropped on
her leaving England in 1767. If Cowper was gratified by this
revival of the old correspondence, all English readers have
reason to be grateful for it; as the letters written to Lady
Hesketh form the most charming models of epistolary composition in our language.
Cowper was at this time employed on his translation of
Homer, which he had begun three or four days after the
completion of Tirocinium,' Nov. io, 1784. He had entered
on the work as a refuge from despondency; but in the course
of a twelvemonth he had got through twenty books of the
Iliad, and resolved to print his translation by subscription.
His Proposals led to the revival of old friendships, and the
formation of new ones. His old schoolfellows, Colman,
Walter Bagot, and Lord Dartmouth, as well as some strangers,
like Fuseli the artist, were interested in the project, and entered into correspondence with him, either in the character
of friends or of critics.
In the month of June, 1786, the vicarage of Olney was
again tenanted by a lady; again the lady was in reality a
visitor to Orchard Side; and again, till the November of the
same year, there were walks, and drives, and harmless gaiety
on all sides. But this time the visitor was Lady Hesketh;
nor did any ill results ensue, save that Mr. Newton became
alarmed lest the spirituality of Cowper's mind should suffer
by contact with worldly relatives who had carriages, and bore
titles. One very good result however did follow. Lady
Hesketh saw that the house at Olney was fast falling into
decay, and that the place itself was just such as might drive
a sane man insane. She therefore took the matter into her
own hands, and hired a house at Weston Underwood, known
as 'The Lodge,' which she furnished comfortably for her
cousin. He expressed his ' Gratitude' to her in the poem of
that name; and, mainly through her exertions, was enabled
to make the remove with 'an Addition of a clear ~oo0 per




XXXViii


LIFE OF COWPER.


annum to his income' —~50 of this being an annuity from
the anonymous friend, whom we have seen reason to identify
with Theodora Jane Cowper.
On the 15th of November, 1786, Cowper left Olney after
passing nineteen years there, for Weston Lodge; where
a bright prospect of happiness seemed to lie before him.
But within a fortnight (and just three days after he had
attained his fifty-fifth year) a heavy calamity fell upon him
and the faithful friend who shared his home. This was the
death, after a few days' illness, of William Unwin, the only
son of the one, and the best-loved friend of the other. The
effect on Cowper was disastrous. His decennial attack had
been evaded in 1783; at which time both mind and sentiment
were pleasingly engaged, by the writing of The Task' on the
one hand, and the enjoyment of Lady Austen's vivacious
society on the other.  But the shock of his friend's death,
occurring at that gloomy period of the year when his spirits
were always at their lowest ebb, proved too severe for him;
and in January, 1787, his mind again gave way. The derangement was of shorter duration than on the previous
occasions; and in about six months' time the patient suddenly recovered, with the full power of resuming at once
his correspondence and his Homeric labours. He was
even equal to the exertion of receiving a succession of
visitors at Weston. Amongst these was Samuel Rose, who
had first called during Cowper's illness, on the way home
from Glasgow University. He came ostensibly to offer the
thanks of the Scottish Professors to the author of 'The
Task,' for whom he left at the same time the welcome gift
of a copy of Burns' Poems. Mr. and Mrs. Newton visited
Weston in 1788, a year which was saddened by the death
of Lady Hesketh's father, Mr. Ashley Cowper; and in the
following year the Poet had the happiness of renewing his
intercourse with his mother's family, after an interval of more
than a quarter of a century. Young John Johnson, the son
of Mrs. Cowper's niece, Catharine Donne, came to visit his
kinsman in the Christmas vacation of I789. On his return




AT WESTON, 1786-9i.


XXXtX


into Norfolk, with much Homer to transcribe, and much to
tell of the Poet's tender reminiscences of his mother, Mrs.
Bodham (another of her nieces) sent Cowper 'the only
picture of his mother to be found in all the world.' This
picture, which he prized ' more highly than the richest jewel
in the British crown,' reached Weston on February 25, 1790,
and inspired the elegy which has for ever linked together the
names of mother and son.
When Dr. Thomas Warton, the learned historian of English Poetry, died in 1790, it was Lady Hesketh's desire to use
her interest on Cowper's behalf, to procure for him the post
of Poet Laureate, thus rendered vacant. He, however, could
not be brought to listen to the proposal, but replied in these
characteristic terms to his cousin, July 8, I790: 'Heaven
guard my brows from the wreath you mention, whatever
wreath beside may hereafter adorn them! It would be a
leaden extinguisher clapped on all the fire of my genius, and
I should never more produce a line worth reading. To speak
seriously, it would make me miserable.'
The Homer had now reached its completion. When
Cowper first undertook the translation, he proposed to himself to write forty lines each day. But so many interruptions
had occurred, and so much time was expended on revision,
that nearly seven years were consumed on the work. The
manuscript was sent to Johnson, September 8, I79o, and
the whole appeared in June, 1791. Johnson took all the expenses on himself, and paid Cowper ~iooo, besides leaving
the copyright in his hands. The translation was favourably
received by the public.  It was acknowledged to be a far
more faithful and scholarly rendering of Homer than Pope's.
The old traditions indeed made some readers doubt the
propriety of using blank verse; and Thurlow, who was one
of these, took the occasion to revive his former acquaintance with Cowper, by corresponding with him on this
point; and avowed himself at last a convert. But Pope's
Homer and Cowper's Homer alike belong to the class of
great works which are to be found in every library, but are




xI


LIFE OF COWPER.


seldom taken down from the shelves, unless in order to be
dusted.
The years occupied by Cowper on this work might have
brought him a far wider extension of fame, had Lady Austen
been still at hand to prompt the composition of original
poems, or had he not already embarked on the undertaking
before Lady Hesketh arrived to fill the vacant post of friend
and counsellor. Yet the mental excitement attendant on
the comparatively mechanical employment of translation
was less than that which original composition would probably
have occasioned; while at the same time Homer afforded
regular occupation, sufficient to interest the mind without
fatiguing it.
No sooner were these labours brought to a close, than the
Poet began to seek new subjects for his Muse.  Lady
Hesketh proposed to him the Mediterranean Sea; but with
the instinct of a man who knows his own powers and their
limits, he at once decided that this was a topic not within
his range.  He listened more kindly to the suggestion of
Mr. Buchanan, a neighbouring clergyman, that he should
write on ' The Four Ages': namely, the infancy, youth, manhood, and old age of man: but he left behind him no more
than a 'brief fragment of an extensive projected poem' on
this theme. He advanced farther in a poem on Yardley Oak,
a subject of his own selection, which he began in i79i; and
which, had he continued it, would have been in every way
worthy of his fame. It is the judgment of Southey, that Cowper ' never bestowed more labour on any of his compositions
than he did upon the commencement of this, nor did he
ever labour more successfully.' And Mr. Hayley describes
it as 'one of the richest and most highly finished pieces of
versification that ever did honour to the fertile genius' of
its author. Unfortunately this poem was laid aside in favour
of a project of his publisher, Johnson; which was, to bring
out a niagnificent edition of Milton, with illustrations by Fuseli,
and with Cowper for editor. Notwithstanding his ardent admiration of Milton, Cowper could not get on with this work.




AT WESTON, I791-5.


xli


He found it easy indeed to translate the Latin and Italian
poems of his great master; but the labour of annotation
was irksome to him. The attempt proved abortive: but
out of it grew Cowper's acquaintance with Hayley. That
amiable man and (in his own day) popular poet was himself engaged by another publisher, to superintend an edition
of Milton. He wrote to Cowper to disclaim all idea of rivalry
with him; and this graceful introduction of himself speedily
led to a strong mutual regard and attachment.
The autumn of 1791 was the last season of hilarity for Cowper. Lady Hesketh was staying at the Lodge, and at Weston
House was Miss Stapleton (the 'Catharina' of his song),
soon to become Mrs. George Courtenay. But all gladness of
heart fled when, in the month of December, Mrs. Unwin
was seized with paralysis. It is true that the attack was
a slight one, nor did it last long: and in May, I792, Weston
was enlivened by a visit from Hayley. He had not been
there many days, when Mrs. Unwin was prostrated by
another and more serious seizure of the same nature. From
this also she rallied sufficiently to be able to accompany
Cowper on the return-visit to Hayley, at Eartham, near
Chichester. Here they remained six weeks, enjoying the
society of their accomplished host, and of several of his
literary friends, whom he invited to meet the hero of
his worship. They returned to Weston in September, and
from that time Mrs. Unwin declined rapidly into a state
of second childishness.  Now it was, that Cowper began
to repay in kind the affectionate tendance which he had
so constantly received at her hands. He watched over her
with the tenderness of a woman; he laid himself out to
indulge her every whim, and to anticipate all her real needs;
he was the only person of those about her, who made no
complaints of the querulous and exacting temper of the poor
invalid.
The anxiety and fatigue arising from such close attendance
on Mrs. Unwin soon began to tell upon the sympathetic
nature of Cowper himself; and he sank into that pitiable




xlii


LIFE OF COWPER.


condition of mind, from which it was ordained that he should
never fully emerge. There were times indeed when the
cloud lifted, and he was able to enjoy communion with
friends, and to throw off occasional verses during his lucid
intervals. He received visits in the course of 1793 from
Lady Hesketh, J. Johnson, Rose, and Lawrence (who took
his portrait); and in the autumn of the same year he wrote
those affecting stanzas ' To Mary,' of which Hayley says, 'I
question if any language on earth can exhibit a specimen of
verse more exquisitely tender.' Yet all this while he was
sinking into lower and lower depths. There was a new
element of superstition in his delusions, too humiliating to
be dwelt on. At length came the tardy recognition of his
literary claims, in the form of a pension from the Crown
of ~300 a year (July 5, 1794); but Cowper was too far
gone to appreciate it, or even to be sensible of the fact.
At this juncture Dr. Willis, the physician who had been
of so much service to King George III, was consulted on
behalf of the sufferer. Change of scene was all that could be
prescribed. Cowper's affectionate kinsman Johnson accordingly conveyed him, with his now helpless fellow-sufferer
Mrs. Unwin, into Norfolk, in July, I795-first to North
Tuddenham; then to Mundesley, on the coast, near Cromer;
next to Dunham Lodge, near Swaffham; then, in the summer of I796, to Mundesley again; and finally, in October of
that year, to East Dereham. Here the Angel of Death
brought to Mary Unwin 'a kind release from her imperfect
state.' She died December 17, 1796, at the age of seventytwo. It may be doubted whether Cowper was in a condition
to realise the fact of this separation: in any case he never
mentioned her name again. At various intervals, he was
enabled to apply himself to the revision of his Homer, and
took pleasure in hearing his own poems and other books read
to him. But for the most part, the cloud lay dark and chill
upon his spirit.  His last original piece was written on
December 20, 1799. He called it The Castaway.'NThere
is in it nothing to horrify the reaar, as the title might




IN NORFOLK, 1795-1800.              xliii
suggest; but much to 'engender sacred pity.' It is not the
appalling shriek of the tortured soul, still struggling fiercely
with the powers of darkness; it is rather the plaintive wail of
one who has from sheer exhaustion given up the contest, and
resigned himself to an uncontrollable destiny.
At length, through God's great mercy, the physical health
which had continued unimpaired throughout the mental conflict, gave signs of failure. In February, i8oo, dropsy appeared in the feet and ankles. A few weeks longer, and
the poor shattered vessel, so long buffeted by tempestuous
billows on the sea of life, drifted into the peaceful haven
of rest. On the 25th of April, i80 and in his sixty-ninth
year, William Cowper died. And if strong men, pilgrims
to the church of Dereham, have dropped tears of brotherly
sympathy while standing before the tomb raised by the loving
hands of Harriet Hesketh, in the Chapel of St. Edward, have
not the angels rejoiced.?








CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE.
173I. Cowper born at Great Berkhampstead, Herts, November 26.
1737. He loses his mother, February 13; and is then sent to
school at Market Street.
1739. War declared against Spain, October I9.
I74i. Retirement of Sir R. Walpole. Cowper enters Westminster School.
1743. Victory of Dettingen, June i6.
1744. War declared against France, March 3P. Alex. Pope
died, aet. 56, May 30.
1745. Battle of Fontenoy, April 3o. The Young Pretender
lands in Scotland, July 25; wins the battle of Prestonpans, September 21.
1746. Charles Edward's Rebellion crushed by his defeat at
Culloden, April I6.
1748. The War of the Austrian Succession ended by the
Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, October 7.    James
Thomson died, aet. 48, August 27. Cowper is entered at the Middle Temple, April 29.
1751. Arcot taken from the French by Clive, August 31.
1753 or 1754. Cowper's first attack of despondency.
1754. Henry Fielding died, aet. 47, October. Cowper called
to the Bar, June I4.
1756. War declared against France, May i8. Minorca taken
from the English, June 28. Cowper loses his father,
August 3.




xlvi


LIFE OF CO WPER.


I757. Pitt's first Administration. The Seven Years' War
begins. Clive retakes Calcutta from Surajah Dowlah,
January 2; wins the battle of Plassey, June 23.
1759. Victory of Minden, August i.  Wolfe killed at the
taking of Quebec, September 13. Cowper removes
to the Inner Temple.
1760. Accession of King George III, October 25.
1761. Warren Hastings becomes a Member of Council at
Calcutta.
1762. War declared against Spain, January 4. Lord Bute
succeeds Pitt.
1763. The Seven Years' War ended by the Peace of Paris,
whereby France cedes Canada to Great Britain,
February io. G. Grenville succeeds Bute. Cowper
is confined at St. Alban's, December 7.
z765. Grenville's Stamp Act passed, March 22. Rockingham
succeeds Grenville in July. The Treaty of Allahabad cedes Bengal to the East India Company,
August I2. Dr. Edward Young died, aet. 8i, April
12.  Cowper becomes an inmate of Mr. Unwin's
house at Huntingdon, November iI.
1766. Pitt created Earl of Chatham, August 4. His second
Ministry.
1767. C. Townshend's Revenues Act.   Cowper settles at
Olney, Bucks, September I4.
1768. Chatham resigns; the Duke of Grafton continues at
the Treasury.
1770. Lord North succeeds Grafton. William Wordsworth
born, April 7.
1772. Warren Hastings Governor of Bengal, April 13.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge born, October 21.
1773. Cowper is deranged for the third time.
1774. The Boston Port Bill passed, March 25. Warren
Hastings Governor-General of all India. Oliver
Goldsmith died, aet. 46, April 4.
1775. American War begins with the battle of Lexington,
April 19; and of Bunker's Hill, June 17.




CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE.


xlvii


1776. American Declaration of Independence, July 4. David
Hume died, aet. 65, August 25.
1777. The Convention of Saratoga, October 17.
1778. French Treaty of Alliance with the American States,
February 6. Death of Chatham, May I4.
1779. Spain joins the Alliance of the States. David Garrick
died, aet. 63, January 20. The Olney Hymns published, February I5.
1780. Rodney's victory at Cape St. Vincent, January i60
The Armed Neutrality. The Gordon Riots in
London, June 2-8. War declared against Holland,
December 20.
I78I. Cornwallis' Capitulation at York Town, October I9.
Sir Eyre Coote defeats Hyder Ali at Porto Novo,
July i; and at Pollilore, August 27.
I782. Lord North resigns, March I5; is succeeded by Rockingham; and he (on his death, July i) by Lord
Shelburne. Preliminaries of Peace with the United
States, Nov. 30. Cowper publishes his first volume
of Poems, March i.
1783. The Peace of Versailles, September 3.
1784. Pitt's East India Bill passed.  Dr. Samuel Johnson
died, aet. 75, December.
1785. Cowper publishes 'The Task,' in July.
1786. Cowper removes from Olney to Weston Underwood,
November 15.
1787. He is deranged for the fourth time.
1788. The Trial of Warren Hastings began, February I3:
(he was acquitted in I795).  Lord Byron born,
January 22.
1789. French Revolution breaks out: the Bastille destroyed,
July I4.
1791. Cowper publishes his Translation of Homer, in June.
1792. Sir Joshua Reynolds died, aet. 69, February 23.
1793. The Reign of Terror in Paris begins, May 31.
1794. Edw. Gibbon died, aet. 57, January i6. Cowper receives a Pension of ~300 from the Crown, July 5.




xlviii           LIFE OF COWPER.
1795. Cowper is removed into Norfolk, in July.
1796. Death of Mrs. Unwin, December 17.
1797. Edmund Burke died, aet. 69, July 9.
1799. Napoleon Buonaparte declared First Consul, November io.
i800. Cowper dies at East Dereham, Norfolk, aet. 68, April 2 5.




THE TASK.
IN SIX BOOKS.
'Fit surculus arbor. -ANONYM.


VOL. II.


B




ADVERTISEMENT.
THE history of the following production is. briefly this: A lady,
fond of blank verse, demanded a poem of that kind from the
Author, and gave him the SOFA for a subject. He obeyed; and
having much leisure, connected another subject with it; and pursuing the train of thought to which his situation and turn of mind
led him, brought forth at length, instead of the trifle which he at
first intended, a serious affair-a Volume.
In the poem on the subject of Education, he would be very sorry
to stand suspected of having aimed his censure at any particular
school. His objections are such as naturally apply themselves to
schools in general. If there were not, as for the most part there is,
wilful neglect in those who manage them, and an omission even of
such discipline as they are susceptible of, the objects are yet too
numerous for minute attention; and the aching hearts of ten
thousand parents, mourning under the bitterest of all disappointments, attest the truth of the allegation. His quarrel, therefore,
is with the mischief at large, and not with any particular instance
of it.




THE TASK.
BOOK I.
THE SOFA.
ARGUMENT:-Historical deduction of seats, from the stool to the sofa, I
-A schoolboy's ramble, Io9-A walk in the country, I40-The scene
described, I59-Rural sounds as well as sights delightful, I8I-Another
walk, 2Io-Mistake concerning the charms of solitude corrected, 233 -Colonnades commended, 252-Alcove, and the view from it, 278-The
wilderness, 350-The grove, 354-The thresher, 356-The necessity
and the benefits of exercise, 367-The works of nature superior to, and
in many instances inimitable by art, 409-The wearisomeness of what
is commonly called a life of pleasure, 462-Change ot scene sometimes
expedient, 506-A common described, and the character of Crazy Kate
introduced, 526-Gipsies, 557-The blessings of a civilised life, 592 -The state most favourable to virtue, 6oo-The South Sea islanders compassionated, but chiefly Omai, 620-His present state of mind supposed,
654-Civilised life friendly to virtue, but not great cities, 678-Great
cities, and London in particular, allowed their due praise, but censured,
693- Fete champ.tre, 739 --- The book concludes with a reflection
on the fatal effects of dissipation and effeminacy upon our public
measures, 749.
I SING the SOFA. I who lately sang
Truth, Hope, and Charity, and touched with awe
The solemn chords, and with a trembling hand,
Escaped with pain from that adventurous flight,
Now seek repose upon an humbler theme;                        5
The theme though humble, yet august and proud
The occasion-for the Fair commands the song.
Time was, when clothing, sumptuous or for use,
Save their own painted skins, our sires had none.
132




4


THE TA SK. I.


As yet black breeches were not, satin smooth,      TO
Or velvet soft, or plush with shaggy pile;
The hardy chief, upon the rugged rock
Washed by the sea, or on the gravelly bank
Thrown up by wintry torrents roaring loud,
Fearless of wrong, reposed his weary strength.      15
Those barbarous ages past, succeeded next
The birthday of Invention; weak at first,
Dull in design, and clumsy to perform.
Joint-stools were then created; on three legs
Upborne they stood. Three legs upholding firm      20
A massy slab, in fashion square or round.
On such a STOOL immortal Alfred sat,
And swayed the sceptre of his infant realms;
And such in ancient halls and mansions drear
May still be seen; but perforated sore,            25
And drilled in holes, the solid oak is found,
By worms voracious eating through and through.
At length a generation more refined
Improved the simple plan; made three legs four,
Gave them a twisted form vermicular,               30
And o'er the seat, with plenteous wadding stuffcd,
Induced a splendid cover, green and blue,
Yellow and red, of tapestry richly wrought
And woven close, or needlework sublime.
There might ye see the peony spread wide,          35
The full-blown rose, the shepherd and his lass,
Lapdog and lambkin with black, staring eyes,
And parrots with twin cherries in their beak.
Now came the cane from India, smooth and bright
With Nature's varnish; severed into stripes        40
That interlaced each other, these supplied
Of texture firm a lattice-work, that braced
The new machine, and it became a CHAIR.
But restless was the Chair; the back erect
Distressed the weary loins that felt no ease;      45
The slippery seat betrayed the sliding part
That pressed it, and the feet hung dangling down,




THE SOFA.


5


Anxious in vain to find the distant floor.
These for the rich: the rest, whom Fate had placed
In modest mediocrity, content                      50
With base materials, sat on well-tanned hides,
Obdurate and unyielding, glassy smooth,
With here and there a tuft of crimson yarn,
Or scarlet crewel, in the cushion fixed;
If cushion might be called, what harder seemed     55
Than the firm oak of which the frame was formed.
No want of timber then was felt or feared
In Albion's happy isle. The lumber stood
Ponderous, and fixed by its own massy weight.
But elbows still were wanting; these, some say,    60
An alderman of Cripplegate contrived,
And some ascribe the invention to a priest
Burly and big, and studious of his ease.
But rude at first, and not with easy slope
Receding wide, they pressed against the ribs,      65
And bruised the side, and, elevated high,
Taught the raised shoulders to invade the ears.
Long time elapsed or e'er our rugged sires
Complained, though incommodiously pent in,
And ill at ease behind. The ladies first           70
'Gan murmur, as became the softer sex.
Ingenious Fancy, never better pleased
Than when employed to accommodate the fair,
Heard the sweet moan with pity, and devised
The soft SETTEE; one elbow at each end,            75
And in the midst an elbow, it received,
United yet divided, twain at once;
So sit two kings of Brentford on one throne,
And so two citizens who take the air,
Close packed and smiling, in a chaise and one.     80
But relaxation of the languid frame,
By soft recumbency of outstretched limbs,
Was bliss reserved for happier days;-so slow
The growth of what is excellent, so hard
To attain perfection in this nether world.          85




6


THE TASK. f.


Thus first Necessity invented Stools,
Convenience next suggested Elbow Chairs,
And Luxury the accomplished SOFA last.
The nurse sleeps sweetly, hired to watch the sick
Whom snoring she disturbs. As sweetly he             90o
Who quits the coachbox at the midnight hour
To sleep within the carriage more secure,
His legs depending at the open door.
Sweet sleep enjoys the curate in his desk,
The tedious rector drawling o'er his head,           95
And sweet the clerk below. But neither sleep
Of lazy nurse who snores the sick man dead,
Nor his who quits the box at midnight hour
To slumber in the carriage more secure,
Nor sleep enjoyed by curate in his desk,            too
Nor yet the dozings of the clerk, are sweet,
Compared with the repose the Sofa yields.
Oh! may I live exempted (while I live
Guiltless of pampered appetite obscene)
From pangs arthritic that infest the toe            105
Of libertine excess. The Sofa suits
The gouty limb, 'tis true; but gouty limb,
Though on a Sofa, may I never feel:
(For I have loved the rural walk through lanes
Of grassy swarth, close cropped by nibbling sheep,   r o
And skirted thick with intertexture firm
Of thorny boughs: have loved the rural walk
O'er hills, through valleys, and by river's brink
E'er since, a truant boy, I passed my bounds,
To enjoy a ramble on the banks of Thames;           115.And still remember, nor without regret,
~f hours that sorrow since has much endeared,
How oft, my slice of pocket-store consumed,
* btifil hungering, pennyless, and far from home,
fed on scarlet hips and stony haws,                120
r blushing craDs. or erriesliatemboss
The bramble, b ack asjet, or sloes austere.
Hard Tai1! but such as boyish appetite




THE SOFA.


7


Disdains not, nor the palate, undepraved
By culinary arts, unsavoury deems.                125
No Sofa then awaited my return,
Nor Sofa then I needed. Youth repairs
His wasted spirits quickly, by long toil
Incurring short fatigue: and though our years,
As life declines, speed rapidly away,             130
And not a year but pilfers as he goes
Some youthful grace that age would gladly keep,
A tooth or auburn lock, and by degrees
Their length and colour from the locks they spare;
The elastic spring of an unwearied foot           135
That mounts the stile with ease, or leaps the fence,
That play of lungs, inhaling and again
Respiring freely the fresh air, that makes
Swift pace or steep ascent no toil to me,
Mine have not pilfered yet; nor yet impaired      140
My relish of fair prospect; (scenes that soothed
Or charmed me young, no longer young,I find
Still soothing, and of power to charm me still.
And witness, dear companion of my walks,
Whose arm this twentieth winter I perceive        145
(Fast locked in mine, with pleasure such as Love,
I Confirmed by long experience of thy worth
/ And well tried virtues, could alone inspireWitness a joy that thou hast doubled long.
Thou knowest my praise of Nature most sincere,    I50
And that my raptures are not conjured up
To serve occasions of poetic pomp,
But genuine, and art partner of them all.
How oft upon yon Eminence our pace
Has slackened to a pause, and we have borne       155
The ruffling wind, scarce conscious that it blew,
While Admiration, feeding at the eye,
And still unsated, dwelt upon the scene.
Thence with what pleasure have we just discerned
The distant plough slow-moving, and beside        I60
His labouring team that swerved not from the track,




8


THE TASK. 1.


The sturdy swain diminshed to a boy!
fHere Ouse, slow-winding through a level plain
Of spacious meads with cattle sprinkled o'er,
Conducts the eye along his sinuous course            i65
Delighted. There, fast rooted in their bank,
Stand, never overlooked, our favourite elms,
i That screen the herdsman's solitary hut;
While far beyond, and overthwart the stream,
That, as with molten glass, inlays the vale,        170
The sloping land recedes into the clouds;
Displaying, on its varied side, the grace
Of hedge-row beauties numberless, square tower,
Tall spire, from which the sound of cheerful bells
Just undulates upon the listening ear,              175
Groves, heaths, and smoking villages, remote.
Scenes must be beautiful which, daily viewed,
Please daily, and whose novelty survives
Long know   dg     Ad__ scratinyofCyears.
Praise justly due to those that I describe.           8 o
-Nor rural s!ghts alone, but rural sounds,
Exhilarate the spirit, and restore
The tone of languid Nature. Mighty winds
That sweep the skirt of some far-spreading wood
Of ancient growth, make music not unlike             I85
The dash of Ocean on his winding shore,
And lull the spirit while they filllhe mind,
Unnumbered branches waving in the blast,
And all their leaves fast fluttering, all at once.
Nor less composure waits upon the roar               I90
Of distant floods, or on the softer voice
Of neighbouring fountain, or of rills that slip
Through the cleft rock, and, chiming as they fall
Upon loose pebbles, lose themselves at length
In matted grass, that with aQlivelier green          195
Betrays the secret of their silent course.)
Nature inanimate employs sweet sounds,
But animated Nature sweeter still,
To soothe and satsfy thie human ear.




THE SOFA.


9r


Ten thousand warblers cheer t_ dy ando            200
The livelong night: nor these alone, whose notes
Nice-fingered Art must emulate in vain,
But cawing rooks, and kites that swim sublime
In still repeated circles, screamping Joud,
The jay, the pie, and even the boding owl          205
That hails the rising moon, have _charms for me.
Sounds inharmonious in themselves and harsh,
Yet heard in scenes where peace for ever reigns,
And only there, please highly for their sake.
Peace to the artist whose ingenious thought      210
Devised che Weatherhouse, that useful toy!
Fearless of humid air and gathering rains,
Forth steps the man-an emblem of myself!
More delicate his timorous mate retires.
When Winter soaks the fields, and female feet       215
Too weak to struggle with tenacious clay,
Or ford the rivulets, are best at home,
The task of new discoveries falls on me.
At such a season, and with such a charge,
Once went I forth, and found, till then unknown,   220
A cottage, whither oft we since repair:
'Tis perched upon the green hill top, but close
Environed with a ring of branching elms
That overhang the thatch, itself unseen
Peeps at the vale below; so thick beset             225
With foliage of such dark redundant growth,
I called the low-roofed lodge the Peasant's Nest.
And hidden as it is, and far remote
From such unpleasing sounds as haunt the ear
I In village or in town, the bayofcurs                 230
Incessant, clinkiinch mgers, grinding wheels,
And infants clamorous whether pleased or pained,
r  Oft have I wished the peaceful covert mine.
Here, I have said, at least I should possess
The poet's treasure, silence, and indulge           235
The dreams of fancy, tranquil and secure.. Vain thought! the dweller in that still retreat




IO


THE TASK. I.


Dearly obtains the refuge it affords.
Its elevated site forbids the wretch
To drink sweet waters of the crystal well;        240
He dips his bowl into the weedy ditch,
And, heavy laden, brings his beverage home,
Far fetched and little worth; nor seldom waits,
Dependant on the baker's punctual call,
To hear his creaking panniers at the door,        245
Angry and sad, and his last crust consumed.
So farewell envy of the Peasant's Nest!
If Solitude make scant the means of life,
Society for me! Thou seeming sweet,
Be still a pleasing object in my view,            250
My visit still, but never mine abode.
Not distant far, a length of Colonnade
Invites us. Monument of ancient taste,
Now scorned, but worthy of a better fate.
Our fathers knew the value of a screen            235
From sultry suns, and in their shaded walks,
And long protracted bowers, enjoyed at noon
The gloom and coolness of declining day.
We bear our shades about us; self-deprived
Of other screen, the thin umbrella spread,        260
And range an Indian waste without a tree.
Thanks to Benevolus-he spares me yet
These chestnuts ranged in corresponding lines,
And though himself so polished, still reprieves
The obsolete prolixity of shade.                  265
Descending now (but cautious, lest too fast)
A sudden steep upon a Rustic Bridge,
We pass a gulf in which the willows dip
Their endant boughs, stoopingasL f._drink.
Hence,.ankle-deep in moss and flowery thyme,     270
We mount again, and feel at every step
Our foot half sunk in hillocks green and soft,
Raised by the mole, the miner of the soil.
He, not unlike the great ones of mankind,
Disfigures Earth, and, plottingj_ the dark,       375




THE SOFA.


II


Toils much to earn a monumental pile,
That may record thefmischiefs he has done.
The summit gained, behold the proud Alcove
That crowns it! yet not all its pride secures
The grand retreat from injuries impressed         280
By rural carvers, who with knives deface
The panels, leaving an obscure, rude name,
In characters uncouth, and spelt amiss.
So strong the zeal to immortalize himself
Beats in the breast of man, that even a few,      285
Few transient years, won from the abyss abhorred
Of blank oblivion, seem a glorious prize,
And even to a clown.-Now roves the eye,
And posted on this sculative height,
Exults in its command. (The sheepfold here        290
Pours out its fleecy tenan s o'er the glebe.
At first, progressive as a stream, they seek
T-he middle field; but scattered by degrees,
Each to his choice, soon whiten all the land.
There from the sunburnt hayfield homeward creeps ) 295
The loaded wain, while lightened'of its charge,
The wain that meets it passes swiftly by,
The boorish driver leaning o'er his team
Vociferous, and impatient of delay.
Nor less attractive is the woodland scene,        300
Diversified with trees of every growth,
Alike yet various. (Here the grey__smroothL trunks
Of ash, or lime, or beech, distinctly shine,
Within the twilight of their distant shades;
There, lost behind a rising ground, the wood      305
Seems sunk, and shortened to its topmost boughs.
No tree in all the grove but has its charms,
Though each its hue peculiar; palgrsome,
And of a wannish grey; the willow such,
And poplar tfiat with silver lines his leaf,      310
And ash far-stretching his umbrageous arm;
Of dee er green the_ elm; and deeper still,
Lord of the woods) the long-surviving oak.




THE TASK. I.


Some glossy-leaved, and shining in the sun,
The maple, and the beech of oily nuts             315
Prolific, and the(lime at dewy eve
Diffusing odours:) nor unnoted pass
The sycamore, capricious in attire,
Now green1 now tawny, and ere autumn yet
Have changed the woods, in scarlet honours bright.  320
O'er these, but -far beyond, a spacious map
Of hill and valley interposed between,
]The Ouse, dividing the well-watered land,
ow glitters in the sun and now retires,
JA  bashful, yet impatient to be seen.           ~ 325
Hence the declivity is sharp and short,    --
And such the reascent; between them weeps
A little Naiad her impoverished urn
All summer long, which winter fills again.
The folded gates would bar my progress now,       330
But that the lord of this enclosed demesne,
Communicative of the good he owns,
Admits me to a share: the guiltless eye
Commits no wrong, nor wastes what it enjoys.
Refreshing change! where now the blazing sun?     335
By short transition we have lost his glare,
And stepped at once into a cooler clime.
Ye fallen avenues! once more I mourn
Your fate unmerited, once more rejoice
That yet a remnant of your race survives.         340
How airy and how light the graceful arch,
Yet awful as the consecrated roof
Re-echoing pious anthems! while beneath
The chequered earth seems restless as a flood
Brushed by the wind. (So sportive is the light     345
Shot through the boughs, it dances as they dance,
Shadow and sunshine intermingling quick,
And darkening and enlightening, as the leaves
Play wanton, every moment, every spot.)
And now, with nerves new braced and spirits cheered, 350
We tread the Wilderness, whose well-rolled walks,




THE SOFA.


13


With curvature of slow and easy sweepDeception innocent-give ample space
To narrow bounds.   The grove receives us next;
Between the upright shafts of whose tall elms     355
We may discern the thresher at his task.
Thump after thump resounds the constant flail,
That seems to swing uncertain, and yet falls
Full on the destined ear. Wide flies the chaff,
The rustling straw sends up a frequent mist       360
Of atoms, sparkling in the noonday beam.
Come hither, ye that press your beds of down
And sleep not; see him sweating o'er his bread
Before he eats it.-'Tis the primal curse,
But softened into mercy; made the pledge          365
Of cheerful days, and nights without a groan.
By ceaseless action all that is subsists.
Constant rotation of the unwearied wheel
That Nature rides upon, maintains her health,
Her beauty, her fertility. She dreads             370
An instant's pause, and lives but while she moves;
Its own revolvency upholds the world.
Winds from all quarters agitate the air,
And fit the limpid element for use,
Else noxious: oceans, rivers, lakes, and streams,  375
All feel the freshening impulse, and are cleansed
By restless undulation; even the oak
Thrives by the rude concussion of the storm;
He seems indeed indignant, and to feel
The impression of the blast with proud disdain,   38S
Frowning as if in his unconscious arm
He held the thunder. But the monarch owes
His firm.stability to what he scorns,
More fixed below, the more disturbed above.
The law by which all creatures else are bound,    385
Binds,man, the lord of all. Himself derives
No mean advantage from a kindred cause,
From strenuous toil his hours of sweetest ease.
The sedentary stretch their lazy length




14


THE TA SK. 1.


When Custom bids, but no refreshment find,        390
For none they need: the languid eye, the cheek
Deserted of its bloom, the flaccid, shrunk,
And withered muscle, and the vapid soul,
Reproach their owner with that love of rest
To which he forfeits even the rest he loves.      395
Not such the alert and active. Measure life
By its true worth, the comforts it affords,
And theirs alone seems worthy of the name.
(Good health, and, its associate in the most,
Good temper; spirits prompt to undertake,         400
And not soon spent, though in an arduous task;
The powers of fancy and strong thought are theirs;
Even age itself seems privileged in them
With clear exemption from its own defects.
A sparkling eye beneath a wrinkled front          405
The veteran shows, and gracing a grey beard
With youthful smiles, descends toward the grave
Sprightly, and old almost without decay.
Like a coy maiden, Ease, when courted most,
Farthest retires-an idol, at whose shrine         410
Who oftenest sacrifice are favoured least.
The love of Nature, and the scenes she draws,
Is Nature's dictate.) Strange! there should be found,
Who, self-imprisond in their proud saloons,
Renounce the odours of t     n fied               41s
For the unscented  ions of the loom;
Who, satisfied with only pencilled scenes,
Prefer to the performance of a God
The inferior wonders of an artist'sJd.
Lovely i   the     imic works of Art;             420
But Nature's works far lovelier. I admire,
None more admires, the painter's magic skill,
Who shows me that which I shall never see,
Conveys a distant country into mine,
And throws Italian light on English walls.        425
gBut imitative strokes can do no more
khan please the eye-sweet Nature every se




THE SOFA.


I5


The air salubrious of her lofty hills,
The cheering fragrance of her dewy vales,
And music of her woods-no works of man              430
May rival these; these all bespeak a power
Peculiar, and exclusively her own.
Beneath the open sky she spreads the feast;
'Tis free toall-'tis every da renewed;
Who scorns it, starves deservedly at home.          435
He does not scorn it, who, imprisoned long
In some unwholesome dungeon, and a prey
To sallow sickness, which the vapours, dank
And clammy, of his dark abode have bred,
Escapes at last to liberty and light.     r         440
His cheek recovers soon its healthful hue,
His eye relumines its extinguished fires,
He walks, he leaps, he runs-is winged with joy,
And riots in the sweets of every breeze.
He does not scorn it, who has long endured         445
A fever's agonies, and fed on drugs;
sNor yet the mariner, his blood inflamed
With acrid salts, his very heart athirst
To gaze at Nature in her green array;
Upon the ship's tall side he stands, possessed      450
With visions prompted by intense desire;
Fair fields appear below, such as he left
Far distant, such as he would die to findHe seeks them headlong, and is seen no more.
The spleen is seldom felt where Flora reigns;     455
uThe lowering eye, the petulance, the frown,.  nd sullen sadness, that o'ershade, distort,
And mar the face of Beauty, when no cause
For such immeasurable woe appears,
These Flora banishes, and gives the fair            460
Sweet smiles, and bloom less transient than her own.
It is the constant revolution, stale
And tasteless, of the same repeated joys,
That palls and satiates, and makes languid life
A pedler's pack, that bows the bearer down.         465




THE TASK. I.


Health_ suffers, and the sWits.ebb; the heart
Recoils from its own choice-at the full feast
Is famished-finds no music in the song,
No smartness in the jest, Snd wonders why.
Yet thousands still desire to journey on,           470
Though halt, and weary of the path they tread.
The paralytic, who can hold her cards
But cannot play them, borrows a friend's hand
To deal and shuffle, to divide and sort
Her mingled suits and sequences, and sits,          475
Spectatress both and spectacle, a sad
And silent cipher, while her proxy plays.
Others are dragged into the crowded room
Between supporters; and, once seated, sit,
Through downright inability to rise,                480
Till the stout bearers lift the corpse again.
These speak a loud memento. Yet even these
Themselves love life, and cling to it, as he
That overhangs a torrent, to a twig.
They love it, and yet ldathe it; fear to die,       485
Yet scorn the purposes for which they ljve.
Then wherefore not renounce them? No-the dread,
The slavish dread of solitude, that breeds
Reflection and remorse, the fear of shame,
And their inveterate habits, all forbid.            490
Whom call we gay? That honour has been long
The boast of mere pretenders to the name.
The innocent are gay-(the lark is-gay,
That dries his feathers, saturate with dew,
Beneath the, rosy cloud, while yet the beams       495
Of dayspring overshoot his humble nest.
The peasant too, a witness of his song,
Himself a songster, is as gay as he.
But save me from the gaiety of those
Whose headaches nail them to a noonday bed;         500
And save me too from theirs whose haggard eyes
Flash desperation, and betray their pangs
For property stripped off by cruel chance;




THE SOFA.


I7


From gaiety that fills the bones with pain,
Tie mouth with blasphemy, the heart with woe.     505
t   The Earth was made so various, that the mind
Of desultory man, studious of change,
And pleased with novelty, might be indulged.
Prospects, however lovely, may be seen
Till half their beauties fade; the weary sight,   510
Too well acquainted with their smiles, slides off
Fastidious, seeking less familiar scenes..-rThen snug enclosures in the sheltered vale,
Where frequent hedges intercept the eye,
Delight us, happy to renounce awhile,             515
Not senseless of its charms, what still we love,
That such short absence may endear it more.
Then forests, or the savage rock, may please,
That hides the seamew in his hollow clefts
Above the reach of man: his hoary head,           520
Conspicuous many a league, the mariner,
Bound homeward, and in hope already there,
Greets with three cheers exulting. At his waist  I
A girdle of half-withered shrubs he shows,
And at his feet the baffled billows die.          525
The common, overgrown with fern, and rough
With prickly goss, that shapeless and deform,
And dangerous to the touch, ha~ yet its bloom,
And decks itself with ornaments of gold,
Yields no unpleasing ramble; there the turf       530
Smells fresh, and, rich in odoriferous herbsAnd fungous fruits of earth, regales the sense
With luxury of unexpected sweets.
There often wanders one, whom better days
Saw better clad, in cloak of satin trimmed  '     535
With lace, and hat with splendid riband bound.
A serving-maid was she, and fell in love
With one who left her, went to sea, and died.
Her Fancy followed him through foaming waves
To distant shores, and she would sit and weep     540
At what a sailor suffers; Fancy too,
C




THE TASK. I.


Delusive most where warmest wishes are,
Would oft anticipate his glad return,
And dream of transports she was not to know.
She heard the doleful tidings of his death-        545
And never smiled again! and now she roams
The dreary waste; there spends the livelong day,
And there, unless when Charity forbids,
The livelong night. A tattered apron hides,
Worn as a cloak, and hardly hides, a gown           550
More tattered still; and both but ill conceal
A bosom heaved with never ceasing sighs.
She begs an idle pin of all she meets,
And hoards them in her sleeve; but needful food,
Though pressed with hunger oft, or comelier clothes, 555
Though pinched with cold, asks never.-Ka J    iscraed!
T see a column of slow-rising smoke
l O'ertop the lofty wood that skirts the wild.
I A vagabond and useless tribe there eat
Their miserable meal. A kettle, slung               56o
X Between two poles upon a stick transverse,
Receives the morsel-flesh obscene of dog,
Or vermin, or at best of cock purloined
I From his accustomed perch. Hard-faring race!; They pick their fuel out of every hedge,           565
/ Which, kindled with dry leaves, just saves unquenched
The spark of life. The sportive wind blows wide
Their fluttering rags, and shows a tawny skin,
The vellum of the pedigree they claim.
Great skill have they in palmistry, and more       570
To conjure clean away the gold they touch,
Conveying worthless dross into its place;
Loud when they beg, dumb only when they steal.
Strange! that a creature rational, and cast
In human mould, should brutalize by choice          575
His nature, and though capable of arts
By which the world might profit, and himself,
Self-banished from society, prefer
Such squalid sloth to honourable toil!




THE SOFA.                    19
Yet even these, though, feigning sickness oft,    580
They swathe the forehead, drag the limping limb,
And vex their flesh with artificial sores,
Can change their whine into a mirthful note
When safe occasion offers; and with dance,
And music of the bladder and the bag,             585
Beguile their woes, and make the woods resound.
Such health and gaiety of heart enjoy
The houseless rovers of the sylvan world;
And breathing wholesome air, and wandering much,
Need other physic none to heal the effects        590
Of loathsome diet, penury, and cold.
Blest he, though undistinguished from the crowd
By wealth or dignity, who dwells secure,
Where man, by nature fierce, has laid aside
His fierceness, having learnt, though slow to learn,  595
The manners and the arts of civil life.
His wants, indeed, are many; but supply
Is obvious, placed within the easy reach
Of temperate wishes and industrious hands.
Here virtue thrives as in her proper soil;        600
Not rude and surly, and beset with thorns,
And terrible to sight, as when she springs,
(If e'er she spring spontaneous) in remote
And barbarous climes, where violence prevails,
And strength is lord of all; but gentle, kind,    605
By culture tamed, by liberty refreshed,
And all her fruits by radiant truth matured.
War and the chase engross the savage whole;
War followed for revenge, or to supplant
The envied tenants of some happier spot,          6io
The chase for sustenance, precarious trust!
His hard condition with severe constraint
Binds all his faculties, forbids all growth
Of wisdom, proves a school in which he learns
Sly circumvention, unrelenting hate,              615
Mean self-attachment, and scarce aught beside.
Thus fare the shivering natives of the north,
C 2




20


THE TASK. I.


And thus the rangers of the western world
Where it advances far into the deep,
Towards the Antarctic. Even the favoured isles    62o
So lately found, although the constant sun
Cheer all their seasons with a grateful smile,
Can boast but little virtue; and inert
Through plenty, lose in morals what they gain
In manners-victims of luxurious ease.             625
These therefore I can pity, placed remote
From all that Science traces, Art invents,
Or Inspiration teaches; and enclosed
In boundless oceans, never to be passed
By navigators uninformed as they,                 630
Or ploughed perhaps by British bark again.
But far beyond the rest, and with most cause,
Thee, gentle savage! whom no love of thee
Or thine, but curiosity, perhaps,
Or else vain-glory, prompted us to draw           635
Forth from thy native bowers, to show thee here
With what superior skill we can abuse
The gifts of Providence, and squander life.
The dream is past; and thou hast found again
Thy cocoas and bananas, palms and yams,           640
And homestall thatched with leaves. But hast thou found
Their former charms? And having seen our state,
Our palaces, our ladies, and our pomp
Of equipage, our gardens, and our sports,
And heard our music; are thy simple friends,      645
Thy simple fare, and all thy plain delights
As dear to thee as once? And have thy joys
Lost nothing by comparison with ours?
Rude as thou art (for we returned thee rude
And ignorant, except of outward show)             65o
I cannot think thee yet so dull of heart
And spiritless, as never to regret
Sweets tasted here, and left as soon as known.
Methinks I see thee straying on the beach,
And asking of the surge that bathes thy foot,     655




THE SOFA.


If ever it has washed our distant shore.
I see thee weep, and thine are honest tears,
A patriot's for his country: thou art sad
At thought of her forlorn and abject state,
From which no power of thine can raise her up.    66o
Thus Fancy paints thee, and though apt to err,
Perhaps errs little when she paints thee thus.
She tells me, too, that duly every morn
Thou climbest the mountain top, with eager eye
Exploring far and wide the watery waste            665
For sight of ship from England. Every speck
Seen in the dim horizon, turns thee pale
With conflict of contending hopes and fears.
But comes at last the dull and dusky eve,
And sends thee to thy cabin, well prepared         670
To dream all night of what the day denied.
Alas! expect it not. We found no bait
To tempt us in thy country. Doing good,
Disinterested good, is not our trade.
We travel far, 'tis true, but not for naught;      675
And must be bribed to compass earth again
By other hopes and richer fruits than yours.
But though true worth and virtue, in the mild
And genial soil of cultivated life
Thrive most, and may perhaps thrive only there,    680
Yet not in cities oft: in proud, and gay,
j And gain-devoted cities. Thither flow,
As to a common and most noisome sewer,
The dregs and feculence of every land.
KiJn cities foul example on most minds               685
X Begets its likeness. Rank abundance breeds,
In gross and pampered cities, sloth, and lust,
And wantonness, and gluttonous excess.
In cities, vice is hidden with most ease,
Or seen with least reproach; and virtue, taught    690
By frequent lapse, can hope no triumph there
Beyond the achievement of successful flight.
I do confess them nurseries of the arts,




THE TASK. If.


In which they flourish most; where, in the beams
Of warm encouragement, and in the eye             695
Of public note, they reach their perfect, size.
Such London is, by taste and wealth proclaimed
The fairest capital of all the world,
By riot and incontinence the worst.
There touched by Reynolds, a dull blank becomes   700
A lucid mirror, in which Nature sees
All her reflected features. Bacon there
Gives more than female beauty to a stone,
And Chatham's eloquence to marble lips.
Nor does the chisel occupy alone                  705
The powers of sculpture, but the style as much;
Each province of her art her equal care.
With nice incision of her guided steel
She ploughs a brazen field, and clothes a soil
So sterile with what charms soe'er she will,      710
The richest scenery and the loveliest forms.
'Where finds Philosophy her eagle eye,
With which she gazes at yon burning disk
Undazzled, and detects and counts his spots?
In London. Where her implements exact,            715
With which she calculates, computes, and scans
All distance, motion, magnitude, and now
Measures an atom, and now girds a world?
In London. Where has commerce such a mart,
So rich, so thronged, so drained, and so supplied,  720
As London, opulent, enlarged, and still
Increasing London? Babylon of old
Not more the glory of the earth than she,
A more accomplished Vworld's chief glory now.
She has her praise. "Now mark a spot or two,    725
That so much beauty kvould do well to purge;
And show this queen of cities, that so fair
May yet be foul; so witty, yet not wise.
It is not seemly, nor of good report,
That she is slack in discipline; more prompt      730
To avenge than to prevent the breach of law;




THE SOFA.


523


That she is rigid in denouncing death
On petty robbers, and indulges life
And liberty, and oft-times honour too,
To peculators 'of the public gold;                735
That thieves at home must hang, but he that puts
Into his overgorged and bloated purse
The wealth of Indian provinces, escapes.
Nor is it well, nor can it come to good,
That, through profane and infidel contempt        740
Of holy writ, she has presumed to annul
And abrogate, as roundly as she may,
The total ordinance and will of God;
Advancing Fashion to the post of Truth,
And centering all authority in modes              745
And customs of her own, till sabbath-rites
Have dwindled into unrespected forms,
And knees and hassocks are well nigh divorced.
( God made the country, and man made the town.)
What wonder then that health and virtue, gifts    750
That can alone make sweet the bitter draught
That life holds out to all, should most abound
And least be threatened in the fields and groves?
Possess ye, therefore, ye who, borne about
In chariots and sedans, know no fatigue           755
But that of idleness, and taste no scenes
But such as Art contrives, possess ye still
Your element; there only ye can shine,
There only minds like yours can do no harm.
Our groves were planted to console at noon        760
The pensive wanderer in their shades. At eve
The moonbeam, sliding softly in between
The sleeping leaves, is all the light they wish,
Birds warbling all the music. We can spare
The splendour of your lamps; they but eclipse     765
Our softer satellite. Your songs confound
Our more harmonious notes: the thrush departs
Scared, and the offended nightingale is mute..There is a public mischief in your mirth;




24                  THE TASK.    I.
It plagues your country. Folly such as yours       770
Graced with a sword, and worthier of a fan,
Has made, what enemies could ne'er have done,
Our arch of empire, steadfast but for you,
A mutilated structure, soon to fall.




BOOK II.


THE TIME-PIECE.
ARGTISENT:-Reflections suggested by the conclusion of the former
Book, I-Peace among the nations recommended on the ground of their
common fellowship in sorrow, 48-Prodigies enumerated, 53-Sicilian
earthquakes, 75-Man rendered obnoxious' to these calamities by sin,
133-God the agent in them, I6I-The philosophy that stops at
secondary causes reproved, 174-Our own late miscarriages accounted
for, 206-Satirical notice taken of our trips to Fontainbleau, 255-But
the pulpit, not satire, the proper engine of reformation, 285-The
reverend advertiser of engraved sermons, 35I-Petit-maitre parson, 372
-The good preacher, 395-Picture of a theatrical clerical coxcomb,
414-Story-tellers and jesters in the pulpit reproved, 463-Apostrophe
to popular applause, 481-Retailers of ancient philosophy expostulated
with, 499-Sum of the whole matter, 53I-Effects of sacerdotal mismanagement on the laity, 545-Their folly and extravagance, 574 -The mischiefs of profusion, 667-Profusion itself, with all its consequent
evils, ascribed, as to its principal cause, to the want of discipline in the
Universities, 699.
OH for a lodge in some vast wilderness,
Some boundless contiguity of shade,
Where rumour of oppression and deceit,
Of unsuccessful or successful war,
Might never reach me more!      My ear is pained,          5
My soul is sick, with every day's report
Of wrong and outrage with which earth is filled.
There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart,
It does not feel for man. The natural bond
Of brotherhood is severed as the flax                     10




2z6


THE TASK. II.


That falls asunder at the touch of fire.
He finds his fellow guilty of a skin
Not coloured like his own, and having power
To enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause
Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey.          IS
Lands intersected by a narrow frith
Abhor each other. Mountains interposed
Make enemies of nations who had else
Like kindred drops been mingled into one.
Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys;        20
And worse than all, and most to be deplored,
As human nature's broadest, foulest blot,
Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat
With stripes, that Mercy, with a bleeding heart,
Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast.          25
Then what is man? And what man, seeing this
And having human feelings, does not blush,
And hang his head, to think himself a man?
I would not have a slave to till my ground,
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep,              30
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth
That sinews bought and sold have ever earned.
No: dear as freedom is, and in my heart's
Just estimation prized above all price,
I had much rather be myself the slave,             35
And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him.
We have no slaves at home:-Then why abroad?
And they themselves once ferried o'er the wave
That parts us, are emancipate and loosed.
Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs   40
Receive our air, that moment they are free;
They touch our country, and their shackles fall.
That's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud
And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then,
And let it circulate through every vein            45
Of all your empire; that where Britain's power
Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too.
Sure there is need of social intercourse




THlE TIME-PIECE.


Benevolence, and peace, and mutual aid,.Between the nations, in a world that seems        50
To toll the deathbell of its own decease,
And by the voice of all its elements
To preach the general doom. When were the, winds
Let slip with such a warrant to destroy?
When did the waves so haughtily o'erleap           55
Their ancient barriers, deluging the dry?
Fires from beneath, and meteors from above
Portentous, unexampled, unexplained,
Have kindled beacons in the skies, and the old
And crazy earth has had her shaking fits           6o
More frequent, and foregone her usual rest.
Is it a time to wrangle, when the props
And pillars of our planet seem to fail,
And Nature, with a dim and sickly eye,
To wait the close of all?  But grant her end       65
More distant, and that prophecy demands
A longer respite, unaccomplished yet;
Still they are frowning signals, and bespeak
Displeasure in his breast who smites the earth
Or heals it, makes it languish or rejoice.         70
And 'tis but seemly, that where all deserve
And stand exposed by common peccancy
To what no few have felt, there should be peace,.
And brethren in calamity should love.
Alas for Sicily! rude fragments now              75
Lie scattered where the shapely column stood.
Her palaces are dust. In all her streets
The voice of singing and the sprightly chord
Are silent. Revelry, and dance, and show,
Suffer a syncope and solemn pause,                 So
While God performs, upon the trembling stage
Of his own works, his dreadful part alone.
How does the earth receive him?! —with what signs
Of gratulation and delight, her King?
Pours she not all her choicest fruits abroad,      85
Her sweetest flowers, her aromatic gums,




THE TASK. II.


Disclosing Paradise where'er he treads?She quakes at his approach. Her hollow womb,
Conceiving thunders, through a thousand deeps
And fiery caverns, roars beneath his foot.         90
The hills move lightly, and the mountains smoke,
For He has touched them. From the extremest point
Of elevation down into the abyss,
His wrath is busy, and his frown is felt.
The rocks fall headlong, and the valleys rise,     95
The rivers die into offensive pools,
And, charged with putrid verdure, breathe a gross
And mortal nuisance into all the air.
What solid was, by transformation strange,
Grows fluid; and the fixed and rooted earth,      Ioo
Tormented into billows, heaves and swells,
Or with vortiginous and hideous whirl
Sucks down its prey insatiable. Immense
The tumult and the overthrow, the pangs
And agonies of human and of brute                 105
Multitudes, fugitive on every side,
And fugitive in vain. The sylvan scene
Migrates uplifted, and, with all its soil,
Alighting in far distant fields, finds out
A new possessor, and survives the change.         xIo
Ocean has caught the frenzy, and upwrought
To an enormous and o'erbearing height,
Not by a mighty wind, but by that voice
Which winds and waves obey, invades the shore
Resistless. Never such a sudden flood,             I15
Upridged so high, and sent on such a charge,
Possessed an inland scene. Where now the throng,
That pressed the beach, and hasty to depart
Looked to the sea for safety? They are gone,
Gone with the refluent wave into the deep-        120
A prince with half his people! Ancient towers,
And roofs embattled high, the gloomy scenes
Where beauty oft and lettered worth consume
Life in the unproductive shades of death,




THE TIME-PIECE.                  29
Fall prone; the pale inhabitants come forth,      125
And happy in their unforeseen release
From all the rigours of restraint, enjoy
The terrors of the day that sets them free.
Who then that has thee, would not hold thee fast,
Freedom! whom they that lose thee so regret,      130
That even a judgment, making way for thee,
Seems, in their eyes, a mercy, for thy sake.
Such evil Sin hath wrought, and such a flame
Kindled in Heaven, that it burns down to earth,
And in the furious inquest that it makes          135
On God's behalf, lays waste his fairest works.
The very elements, though each be meant
The minister of man, to serve his wants,
Conspire against him. With his breath, he draws
A plague into his blood; and cannot use           140
Life's necessary means, but he must die.
Storms rise to o'erwhelm him; or if stormy winds
Rise not, the waters of the deep shall rise,
And needing none assistance of the storm,
Shall roll themselves ashore, and reach him there.  r45
The earth shall shake him out of all his holds,
Or make his house his grave: nor so content,
Shall counterfeit the motions of the flood,
And drown him in her dry and dusty gulfs.
What then? Were they the wicked above all,        I50
And we the righteous, whose fast-anchored isle
Moved not, while theirs was rocked like a light skiff,
The sport of every wave? No: none are clear,
And none than we more guilty. But where all
Stand chargeable with guilt, and to the shafts    155
Of wrath obnoxious, God may choose his mark;
May punish, if he please, the less, to warn
The more malignant.; If he spared not them,
Tremble and be amazed at thine escape,
Far guiltier England! lest he spare not thee.     i6o
Happy the man who sees a God employed
In all the good and ill that chequer life!




30


THE TASK. II.


Resolving all events, with their effects
And manifold results, into the will
And arbitration wise of the Supreme.              165
Did not his eye rule all things, and intend
The least of our concerns, (since from the least
The greatest oft originate) could Chance
Find place in his dominion, or dispose
One lawless particle to thwart his plan,          170
Then God might be surprised, and unforeseen
Contingence might alarm him, and disturb
The smooth and equal course of his affairs.
This truth, Philosophy, though eagle-eyed
In Nature's tendencies, oft overlooks;            175
And having found his instrument, forgets
Or disregards, or more presumptuous still,
Denies the power that wields it. God proclaims
His hot displeasure against foolish men
That live an atheist life; involves the Heaven    18o
In tempests; quits his grasp upon the winds,
And gives them all their fury; bids a plague
Kindle a fiery boil upon the skin,
And putrify the breath of blooming Health.
He calls for Famine, and the meagre fiend         I85
Blows mildew from between his shrivelled lips,
And taints the golden ear. He springs his mines,
And desolates a nation at a blast.
Forth steps the spruce philosopher, and tells
Of homogeneal and discordant springs              I90
And principles; of causes, how they work
By necessary laws their sure effects;
Of action and reaction. He has found
The source of the disease that Nature feels,
And bids the world take heart and banish fear.    I95
Thou fool! Will thy discovery of the cause
Suspend the effect, or heal it? Has not God
Still wrought by means since first He made the world?
And did He not of old employ his means
To drown it? What is his creation less            200




THE TIME-,PIECE.


3"


Than a capacious reservoir of means
Formed for his use, and ready at his will?
Go, dress thine eye with eyesalve; ask of him,
Or ask of whomsoever he has taught,
And learn, though late, the genuine cause of all.  205
England, with all thy faults, I love thee still,
My country! and while yet a nook is left
Where English minds and manners may be found,
Shall be constrained to love thee. Though thy clime
Be fickle, and thy year, most part, deformed      210
With dripping rains, or withered by a frost,
I would not yet exchange thy sullen skies,
And fields without a flower, for warmer France
With all her vines; nor for Ausonia's groves
Of golden fruitage, and her myrtle bowers.        215
To shake thy senate, and from heights sublime
Of patriot eloquence to flash down fire
Upon thy foes, was never meant my task;
But I can feel thy fortunes, and partake
Thy joys and sorrows, with as true a heart        220
As any thunderer there. And I can feel
Thy follies too; and with a just disdain
Frown at effeminates, whose very looks
Reflect dishonour on the land I love.
How, in the name of soldiership and sense,        225
Should England prosper, when such things, as smooth
And tender as a girl, all essenced o'er
'With odours, and as profligate as sweet;
Who sell their laurel for a myrtle wreath,
And love when they should fight; when such as these 230
Presume to lay their hand upon the ark
Of her magnificent and awful cause?
Time was, when it was praise and boast enough
In every clime, and travel where we might,
That we were born her children. Praise enough     235
To fill the ambition of a private man,
That Chatham's language was his mother tongue,
And Wolfe's great name compatriot with his own.




32


THE TASK. II.


Farewell those honours, and farewell with them
The hope of such hereafter! They have fallen,     240
Each in his field of glory; one in arms,
And one in council. Wolfe, upon the lap
Of smiling Victory that moment won,
And Chatham, heart-sick of his country's shame.
They made us many soldiers. Chatham, still        245
Consulting England's happiness at home,
Secured it by an unforgiving frown,
If any wronged her. Wolfe, where'er he fought,
Put so much of his heart into his act,
That his example had a magnet's force,            250
And all were swift to follow whom all loved.
Those suns are set. Oh, rise some other such!
Or all that we have left, is empty talk
Of old achievements, and despair of new.
Now hoist the sail, and let the streamers float  255
Upon the wanton breezes. Strew the deck
With lavender, and sprinkle liquid sweets,
That no rude savour maritime invade
The nose of nice nobility. Breathe soft,
Ye clarionets, and softer still, ye flutes,       26o
That winds and waters, lulled by magic sounds,
May bear us smoothly to the Gallic shore.
True, we have lost an empire-let it pass.
True, we may thank the perfidy of France,
That picked the jewel out of England's crown,     265
With all the cunning of an envious shrew.
And let that pass-'twas but a trick of state.
A brave man knows no malice, but at once
Forgets in peace the injuries of war,
And gives his direst foe a friend's embrace.      270
And shamed as we have been, to the very beard
Braved and defied, and in our own sea proved
Too weak for those decisive blows that once
Ensured us mastery there, we yet retain
Some small preeminence; we justly boast           275
At least superior jockeyship, and claim




THE TIME-PIECE.                  33
The honours of the turf as all our own.
Go then, well worthy of the praise ye seek,
And show the shame ye might conceal at home,
In foreign eyes!-be grooms, and win the plate,     280
Where once your noble fathers won a crown!
'Tis generous to communicate your skill
To those that need it. Folly is soon learned,
And under such preceptors, who can fail?
There is a pleasure in poetic pains              285
Which only poets know. The shifts and turns,
The expedients and inventions multiform,
To which the mind resorts, in chase of terms
Though apt, yet coy, and difficult to winTo arrest the fleeting images that fill            290
The mirror of the mind, and hold them fast,
And force them sit, till he has pencilled off
A faithful likeness of the forms he views;.,
Then to dispose his copies with such art
That each may find its most propitious light,      295
And shine by situation, hardly less
Than by the labour and the skill it cost;
Are occupations of the poet's mind
So pleasing, and that steal away the thought
With such address from themes of sad import,       300
That lost in his own musings, happy man!
He feels the anxieties of life, denied
Their wonted entertainment, all retire.
Such joys has he that sings. But ah! not such,
Or seldom such, the hearers of his song.           305
Fastidious, or else listless, or perhaps
Aware of nothing arduous in a task
They never undertook, they little note
His dangers or escapes, and haply find
Their least amusement where he found the most.     310
But is amusement all? Studious of song,
And yet ambitious not to sing in vain,
I would not trifle merely, though the world
Be loudest in their praise who do no more.
VOL. II.                D




34


THE TASK. II.


Yet what can satire, whether grave or gay?         315
It may correct a foible, may chastise
The freaks of fashion, regulate the dress,
Retrench a swordblade, or displace a patch;<
But where are its sublimer trophies found?
What vice has it subdued? whose heart reclaimed     320
By rigour? or whom laughed into reform?
Alas! Leviathan is not so tamed;
Laughed at, he laughs again; and stricken hard,
Turns to the stroke his adamantine scales,
That fear no discipline of human hands.             325
The pulpit, therefore, (and I name it filled
With solemn awe, that bids me well beware
With what intent I touch that holy thing)
The pulpit (when the satirist has at last,
Strutting and vapouring in an empty school,        330
Spent all his force, and made no proselyte)
I say the pulpit (in the sober use
Of its legitimate, peculiar powers)
Must stand acknowledged, while the world shall stand,
The most important and effectual guard,             335
Support, and ornament of Virtue's cause.
There stands the messenger of truth; there stands
The legate of the skies!-His theme divine,
His office sacred, his credentials clear.
By him, the violated law speaks out                340
Its thunders; and by him, in strains as sweet
As angels use, the Gospel whispers peace.
He stablishes the strong, restores the weak,
Reclaims the wanderer, binds the broken heart,
And armed himself in panoply complete              345
Of heavenly temper, furnishes with arms
Bright as his own, and trains by every rule
Of holy discipline, to glorious war,
The sacramental host of God's elect.
Are all such teachers?  Would to Heaven all were!  350
But hark-the Doctor's voice!-fast wedged between
Two empirics he stands, and with swoln cheeks




THE TIME-PIECE.


35


Inspires the News, his trumpet. Keener far
Than all invective is his bold harangue,
While, through that public organ of report,        355
He hails the clergy, and defying shame,
Announces to the world his own and theirs.
He teaches those to read, whom schools dismissed,
And colleges, untaught; sells accent, tone,
And emphasis in score, and gives to prayer         360
The adagio and andante it demands.
He grinds divinity of other days
Down into modern use; transforms old print
To zigzig manuscript, and cheats the eyes
Of gallery critics by a thousand arts.             365
Are there who purchase of the Doctor's ware?
Oh name it not in Gath! it cannot be,
That grave and learned clerks should need such aid.
He doubtless is in sport, and does but droll,
Assuming thus a rank unknown before-                370
Grand caterer and dry nurse of the church!
I venerate the man whose heart is warm,
Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life
Coincident,.exhibit lucid proof
That he is honest in the sacred cause.             375
To such I render more than mere respect,
Whose actions say that they respect themselves.
But loose in morals, and in manners vain,
In conversation frivolous, in dress
Extreme, at once rapacious and profuse;             380
Frequent in Park with lady at his side,
Ambling and prattling scandal as he goes;
But rare at home, and never at his books,
Or with his pen, save when he scrawls a card;
Constant at routs, familiar with a round           385
Of ladyships, a stranger to the poor;
Ambitious of preferment for its gold,
And well prepared, by ignorance and sloth,
By infidelity and love o' the world,
To make God's work a sinecure; a slave             390
D 2




36


THE TA SK. II.


To his own pleasures and his patron's pride
From such apostles, 0 ye mitred heads
Preserve the church! and lay not careless hands
On skulls that cannot teach, and will not learn.
Would I describe a preacher, such as Paul,      395
Were he on earth, would hear, approve, and own,
Paul should himself direct me. I would trace
His master-strokes, and draw from his design.
I would express him simple, grave, sincere;
In doctrine uncorrupt; in language plain,         400
And plain in manner; decent, solemn, chaste
And natural in gesture; much impressed
Himself, as conscious of his awful charge,
And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds
May feel it too; affectionate in look,            405
And tender in address, as well becomes
A messenger of grace to guilty men.
Behold the picture!-Is it like?-Like whom?
The things that mount the rostrum with a skip,
And then skip down again; pronounce a text;       410
Cry hem! and reading what they never wrote
Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work,,
And with a well-bred whisper close the scene!
In man or woman, but far most in man,
And most of all in man that ministers             415
And serves the altar, in my soul I loathe
All affectation. 'Tis my perfect scorn;
Object of my implacable disgust.
What!-will a man play tricks, will he indulge
A silly fond conceit of his fair form             42.0
And just proportion, fashionable mien
And pretty face, in presence of his God?
Or will he seek to dazzle me with tropes,
As with the diamond on his lily hand,
And play his brilliant parts before my eyes,      425
When I am hungry for the bread of life?
He mocks his Maker, prostitutes and shames
His noble office, and, instead of truth,




THE TIME-PIECE.


37


Displaying his own beauty, starves his flock!
Therefore avaunt all attitude, and stare,         430
And start theatric, practised at the glass!
I seek divine simplicity in him
Who handles things divine; and all beside,
Though learned with labour, and though much admired
By curious eyes and judgments ill informed        435
To me is odious as the nasal twang
Heard at conventicle, where worthy men,
Misled by custom, strain celestial themes
Through the pressed nostril, spectacle-bestrid.
Some, decent in demeanour while they preach,    440
That task performed, relapse into themselves,
And having spoken wisely, at the close
Grow wanton, and give proof to every eye,
Whoe'er was edified, themselves were not!
Forth comes the pocket mirror.-First we stroke    445
An eyebrow, next compose a straggling lock,
Then, with an air most gracefully performed,
Fall back into our seat, extend an arm,
And lay it at its ease with gentle care,
With handkerchief in hand depending low:          450
The better hand, more busy, gives the nose
Its bergamot, or aids the indebted eye
With opera glass to watch the moving scene,
And recognise the slow retiring fair.Now this is fulsome; and offends me more          455
Than in a churchman slovenly neglect
And rustic coarseness would. A heavenly mind
May be indifferent to her house of clay,
And slight the hovel as beneath her care;
But how a body so fantastic, trim,                460
And quaint in its deportment and attire,
Can lodge a heavenly mind-demands a doubt.
He that negotiates between God and man,
As God's ambassador, the grand concerns
Of judgment and of mercy, should beware           465
Of lightness in his speech. 'Tis pitiful




38


THE TA SK. II.


To court a grin, when you should woo a soul;
To break a jest, when pity would inspire
Pathetic exhortation; and to address
The skittish fancy with facetious tales,          470
When sent with God's commission to the heart.
So did not Paul. Direct me to a quip
Or merry turn in all he ever wrote,
And I consent you take it for your text,
Your only one, till sides and benches fail.       475
No: he was serious in a serious cause,
And understood too well the weighty terms
That he had ta'en in charge. He would not stoop
To conquer those by jocular exploits,
Whom Truth and Soberness assailed in vain.        480
0 Popular Applause! what heart of man
Is proof against thy sweet seducing charms?
The wisest and the best feel urgent need
Of all their caution in thy gentlest gales;
But swelled into a gust-who then, alas!           485
With all his canvas set, and inexpert,
And therefore heedless, can withstand thy power?
Praise from the rivelled lips of toothless, bald
Decrepitude, and in the looks of lean
And craving Poverty, and in the bow               490
Respectful of the smutched artificer,
Is oft too welcome, and may much disturb
The bias of the purpose. How much more,
Poured forth by Beauty splendid and polite,
In language soft as Adoration breathes!           495
Ah spare your idol! think him human still;
Charms he may have, but he has frailties too;
Dote not too much, nor spoil what ye admire.
All truth is from the sempiternal source
Of Light Divine. But Egypt, Greece, and Rome      500
Drew from the stream below. More favoured, we
Drink, when we choose it, at the fountain head.
To them it flowed much mingled and defiled
With hurtful error, prejudice, and dreams




THE TI1ME-PIECE.


39


Illusive of philosophy, so called,                505
But falsely. Sages after sages strove
In vain to filter off a crystal draught
Pure from the lees, which often more enhanced
The thirst than slaked it, and not seldom bred
Intoxication and delirium wild.                   5ro
In vain they pushed inquiry to the birth
And spring-time of the world; asked, Whence is man?
Why formed at all? And wherefore as he is?
Where must he find his Maker? With what rites
Adore him? Will he hear, accept, and bless?       5I5
Or does he sit regardless of his works?
Has man within him an immortal seed?
Or does the tomb take all? If he survive
His ashes, where, and in what weal or woe?
Knots worthy of solution, which alone             520
A Deity could solve. Their answers, vague
And all at random, fabulous and dark,
Left them as dark themselves. Their rules of life,
Defective and unsanctioned, proved too weak
To bind the roving appetite, and lead             525
Blind nature to a God not yet revealed.
'Tis Revelation satisfies all doubts,
Explains all mysteries, except her own,
And so illuminates the path of life,
That fools discover it, and stray no more.        530
Now tell me, dignified and sapient sir,
My man of morals, nurtured in the shades
Of Academus, is this false or true?
Is Christ the abler teacher, or the schools?
If Christ, then why resort at every turn          535
To Athens or to Rome, for wisdom short
Of man's occasions, when in him reside
Grace, knowledge, comfort-an unfathomed store?
How oft, when Paul has served us with a text,
Has Epictetus, Plato, Tully, preached!            540
Men that, if now alive, would sit content
And humble learners of a Saviour's worth,




AO


THE TA SK. II.


Preach it who might. Such was their love of truth,
Their thirst of knowledge, and their candour too!
And thus it is. (The pastor, either vain          545
By nature, or by flattery made so, taught
To gaze at his own splendour, and to exalt
Absurdly, not his office, but himself;
Or unenlightened, and too proud to learn;
Or vicious, and not therefore apt to teach;       550
Perverting often, by the stress of lewd
And loose example, whom he should instruct;
Exposes, and holds up to broad disgrace,
The noblest function, and discredits much
The brightest truths that man has ever seen.)     555
For ghostly counsel, if it either fall
Below the exigence, or be not backed
With show of love, at least with hopeful proof
Of some sincerity, on the giver's part;
Or be dishonoured, in the exterior form           560
And mode of its conveyance, by such tricks
As move derision, or by foppish airs
And histrionic mummery, that let down
The pulpit to the level of the stage,
Drops from the lips a disregarded thing.          565
The weak perhaps are moved, but are not taught,
While prejudice in men of stronger minds
Takes deeper root, confirmed by what they see.
A relaxation of Religion's hold
Upon the roving and untutored heart               570
Soon follows, and the curb of conscience snapped,
The laity run wild.-But do they now?
Note their extravagance, and be convinced.
As nations ignorant of God contrive
A wooden one, so we, no longer taught             575
By monitors that mother church supplies,
Now make our own. Posterity will ask
(If e'er posterity see verse of mine)
Some fifty or a hundred lustnims hence,
What was a Monitor in George's days?              580




THE TIME-PIECE.                  41
My very gentle reader yet unborn,
Of whom I needs must augur better things,
Since Heaven would sure grow weary of a world
Productive only of a race like us,
A Monitor is wood-plank shaven thin.              585
We wear it at our backs. There, closely braced
And neatly fitted, it compresses hard
The prominent and most unsightly bones,
And binds the shoulders flat. We prove its use
Sovereign, and most effectual, to secure          590
A form not now gymnastic as of yore,
From rickets and distortion, else our lot.
But thus admonished, we can walk erectOne proof at least of manhood! while the friend
Sticks close, a Mentor worthy of his charge.       595
Our habits, costlier than Lucullus wore,
And by caprice as multiplied as his,
Just please us while the passion is at full,
But change with every moon. The sycophant
That waits to dress us, arbitrates their date;    6oo
Surveys his fair reversion with keen eye;
Finds one ill made, another obsolete;
This fits not nicely, that is ill conceived;
And making prize of all that he condemns,
With our expenditure defrays his own.              605
(Variety's the very spice of life,)
That gives it all its flavour. We have run
Through every change that Fancy, at the loom
Exhausted, has had genius to supply;
And studious of mutation still, discard            6io
A real elegance, a little used,
For monstrous novelty and strange disguise.
We sacrifice to dress, till household joys
And comforts cease. Dress drains our cellar dry,
And keeps our larder lean; puts out our fires,     615
And introduces hunger, frost, and woe,
Where peace and hospitality might reign.
What man that lives, and that knows how to live,




THE TASK. II.


Would fail to exhibit at the public shows
A form as splendid as the proudest there,         620
Though Appetite raise outcries at the cost?
A man o' the town dines late, but soon enough,
With reasonable forecast and dispatch,
To insure a side-box station at half price.
You think, perhaps, so delicate his dress,        625
His daily fare as delicate. Alas!
He picks clean teeth, and, busy as he seems
With an old tavern quill, is hungry yet.
The Rout is Folly's circle, which she draws
With magic wand. So potent is the spell,          630
That none, decoyed into that fatal ring,
Unless by Heaven's peculiar grace, escape.
There we grow early grey, but never wise;
There form connexions, but acquire no friend;
Solicit pleasure, hopeless of success;            635
Waste youth in occupations only fit
For second childhood; and devote old age
To sports which only childhood could excuse.
There they are happiest who dissemble best
Their weariness; and they the most polite         640
Who squander time and treasure with a smile,
Though at their own destruction. She that asks
Her dear five hundred friends, contemns them all,
And hates their coming. They (what can they less?)
Make just reprisals, and with cringe and shrug,   645
And bow obsequious, hide their hate of her.
All catch the frenzy, downward from her Grace,
Whose flambeaux flash against the morning skies,
And gild our chamber ceilings as they pass,
To her who, frugal only that her thrift           650
May feed excesses she can ill afford,
Is hackneyed home unlackeyed; who, in haste
Alighting, turns the key in her own door,
And, at the watchman's lantern borrowing light,
Finds a cold bed her only comfort left.           655
Wives beggar husbands, husbands starve their wives,




THE TIME-PIECE.


43


On Fortune's velvet altar offering up
Their last poor pittance-Fortune, most severe
Of goddesses yet known, and costlier far
Than all that held their routs in Juno's heaven!   66o
(So fare we in this prison-house, the world; )
And 'tis a fearful spectacle to see
So many maniacs dancing in their chains.
They gaze upon the links that hold them fast,
With eyes of anguish, execrate their lot,          665
Then shake them in despair, and dance again.
Now basket up the family of plagues
That waste our vitals; peculation, sale
Of honour, perjury, corruption, frauds
By forgery, by subterfuge of law,                  670
By tricks and lies as numerous and as keen
As the necessities their authors feel;
Then cast them, closely bundled, every brat
At the right door. Profusion is thq sire.
Profusion unrestrained, with all that's base       675
In character has littered all the land,
And bred, within the memory of no few,
A priesthood such as Baal's was of old,
A people such as never was till now.
It is a hungry vice;-it eats up all               680
That gives society its beauty, strength,
Convenience, and security, and use;
Makes men mere vermin, worthy to be trapped
And gibbeted, as fast as catchpole-claws
Can seize the slippery prey, unties the knot       685
Of union, and converts the sacred band
That holds mankind together, to a scourge.
Profusion, deluging a state with lusts
Of grossest nature and of worst effects,
Prepares it for its ruin; hardens, blinds,         690
And warps the consciences of public men,
Till they can laugh at virtue, mock the fools
That trust them, and in the end disclose a face
That would have shocked Credulity herself,




AA


THE TA SK. II.


Unmasked, vouchsafing this their sole excuse-      695
Since all alike are selfish, why not they?
This does Profusion, and the accursed cause
Of such deep mischief has itself a cause.
In colleges and halls, in ancient days,
When learning, virtue, piety, and truth            700
Were precious, and inculcated with care,
There dwelt a sage called Discipline. His head,
Not yet by time completely silvered o'er,
Bespoke him past the bounds of freakish youth,
But strong for service still, and unimpaired.      705
His eye was meek and gentle, and a smile
Played on his lips, and in his speech was heard
Paternal sweetness, dignity, and love.
The occupation dearest to his heart
Was to encourage goodness. He would stroke         710
The head of modest and ingenuous worth
That blushed at its own praise; and press the youth
Close to his side that pleased him. Learning grew
Beneath his care, a thriving vigorous plant;
The mind was well-informed, the passions held      715
Subordinate, and diligence was choice.
If e'er it chanced, as sometimes chance it must,
That one among so many overleaped
The limits of control, his gentle eye
Grew stern, and darted a severe rebuke;            720
His frown was full of terror, and his voice
Shook the delinquent with such fits of awe
As left him not, till penitence had won
Lost favour back again, and closed the breach.
/'But Discipline, a faithful servant long,          725
l Declined at length into the vale of years;
A palsy struck his arm, his sparkling eye
Was quenched in rheums of age,-his voice, unstrung,
'/Grew tremulous, and moved derision more
ifThan reverence, in perverse rebellious youth.     730
So colleges and halls neglected much
YTheir good old friend) and Discipline at length.




THE TIME-PIECE.


45


O'erlooked and unemployed, fell sick, and died.
Then Study languished, Emulation slept,
And Virtue fled. (The schools became a scene      735
Of solemn farce, where Ignorance in stilts,
His cap well-lined with logic not his own,
With parrot tongue performed the scholar's part,
Proceeding soon a graduated dunce.>
Then compromise had place, and scrutiny           740
Became stone blind; precedence went in truck,
And he was competent whose purse was so.
A dissolution of all bonds ensued;
The curbs invented for the mulish mouth
Of headstrong youth were broken; bars and bolts   745
Grew rusty by disuse; and massy gates
Forgot their office, opening with a touch;
Till gowns at length are found mere masquerade,
The tasseled cap and the spruce band a, jest,
A mockery of the world! What need of these        750
For gamesters, jockeys, brothellers impure,
Spendthrifts, and booted sportsmen, oftener seen
With belted waist and pointers at their heels
Than in the bounds of duty?  What was learned,
If aught was learned in childhood, is forgot;     755
And such expense as pinches parents blue,
And mortifies the liberal hand of love,
Is squandered in pursuit of idle sports
And vicious pleasures; buys the boy a name
That sits a stigma on his father's house,         760
And cleaves through life inseparably close
To him that wears it. What can after-games
Of riper joys, and comferce with the world,
The lewd vain world that must receive him soon,
Add to such erudition, thus acquired              765
Where science and where virtue are professed?
They may confirm his habits, rivet fast
His folly, but to spoil him is a task
That bias defiance to the united powers
Of fashion, dissipation, taverns, stews.          770




46


THE TASK. II.


Now blame we most the nurslings, or the nurse?
The children, crooked, and twisted, and deformed
Through want of care; or her whose winking eye
And slumbering oscitancy mars the brood?
The nurse, no doubt. Regardless of her charge,    775
She needs herself correction; needs to learn
That it is dangerous sporting with the world,
With things so sacred as a nation's trust,
The nurture of her youth, her dearest pledge.
All are not such. I had a brother once-         780
Peace to the memory of a man of worth,
A man of letters, and of manners too!
Of manners sweet as Virtue always wears,
When gay Goodnature dresses her in smiles.
He graced a college, in which order yet           785
Was sacred, and was honoured, loved, and wept
By more than one, themselves conspicuous there.
Some minds are tempered happily, and mixed
With such ingredients of good sense and taste
Of what is excellent in man, they thirst          790
With such a zeal to be what.they approve,
That no restraints can circumscribe them more
Than they themselves by choice, for wisdom's sake.
Nor can example hurt them: what they see
Of vice in others but enhancing more              795
The charms of virtue in their just esteem.
If such escape contagion, and emerge
Pure, from so foul a pool, to shine abroad,
And give the world their talents and themselves,
Small thanks to those whose negligence or sloth   800
Exposed their inexperience to the snare,
And left them to an undirected choice.
See then the quiver broken and decayed,
In which are kept our arrows! Rusting there
In wild disorder, and unfit for use,              805
What wonder, if discharged into the world,
They shame their shooters with a random flight,
Their points obtuse, and feathers drunk with winel




THE TIME-PIECE.


47


Well may the Church wage unsuccessful war,
With such artillery armed. Vice parries wide      81o
The undreaded volley with a sword of straw,
And stands an impudent and fearless mark.
Have we not tracked the felon home, and found
His birth-place and his dam? The country mourns,
Mourns because every plague that can infest       815
Society, and that saps and worms the base
Of the edifice that policy has raised,
Swarms in all quarters; meets the eye, the ear,
And suffocates the breath at every turn.
Profusion breeds them; and the cause itself       820
Of that calamitous mischief has been found:
Found too where most offensive, in the skirts
Of the robed pedagogue! Else let the arraigned
Stand up unconscious, and refute the charge.
So when the Jewish leader stretched his arm,      825
And waved his rod divine, a race obscene,
Spawned in the muddy beds of Nile, came forth,
Polluting Egypt: gardens, fields, and plains
Were covered with the pest; the streets were filled;
The croaking nuisance lurked in every nook;       830
Nor palaces, nor even chambers, 'scaped;
And the land stank-so numerous was the fry.




BOOK III.


THE GARDEN.
ARGUMENT:-Self-recollection and reproof, I-Address to domestic
happiness, 41-Some account of myself, Io8-The vanity of many of
their pursuits who are reputed wise, I24-Justification of my censures,
191-Divine illumination necessary to the most expert philosopher, 22i
-The question, What is truth? answered by other questions, 26IDomestic happiness addressed again, 29o-Few lovers of the country,
293-My tame hare, 334-Occupations of a retired gentleman in his
garden, 352-Pruning, 408-Framing, 435-Raising the cucumber, 446
-Greenhouse, 566-Sowing of flower seeds, 624-The country preferable
to the town, even in the winter, 675-Reasons why it is deserted at that
season, 728-Ruinous effects of gaming and of expensive improvements,
760-Book concludes with an apostrophe to the metropolis, 811.
As one who long in thickets and in brakes
Entangled, winds now this way and now that
His devious course uncertain, seeking home;
Or having long in miry ways been foiled
And sore discomfited, from slough to slough               5
Plunging, and half despairing of escape;
If chance at length he find a greensward smooth
And faithful to the foot, his spirits rise,
He cherups brisk his ear-erecting steed,
And winds his way with pleasure and with ease;          o1
So I, designing other themes, and called
To adorn the Sofa with eulogium due,
To tell its slumbers, and to paint its dreams,
Have rambled wide. In country, city, seat
Of academic fame (howe'er deserved)                      15
Long held, and scarcely disengaged at last.




THE GARDEN.


49


But now with pleasant pace a cleanlier road
I mean to tread. I feel myself at large,
Courageous, and refreshed for future toil,
If toil await me, or if dangers new.               20
Since pulpits fail, and sounding-boards reflect
Most part an empty ineffectual sound,
What chance that I, to fame so little known,
Nor conversant with men or manners much,
Should speak to purpose, or with better hope       25
Crack the satiric thong? 'Twere wiser far
For me, enamoured of sequestered scenes,
And charmed with rural beauty, to repose
Where chance may throw me, beneath elm or vine,
My languid limbs, when summer sears the plains,    30
Or when rough winter rages, on the soft
And sheltered Sofa, while the nitrous air
Feeds a blue flame, and makes a cheerful hearth;
There, undisturbed by Folly, and apprised
How great the danger of disturbing her,            35
To muse in silence, or at least confine
Remarks that gall so many, to the few
My partners in retreat. Disgust concealed
Is oft-times proof of wisdom, when the fault
Is obstinate, and cure beyond our reach.           40
Domestic Happiness, thou only bliss
Of Paradise that has survived the fall!
Though few now taste thee unimpaired and pure,
Or tasting long enjoy thee; too infirm,
Or too incautious, to preserve thy sweets          45
Unmixed with drops of bitter, which Neglect
Or Temper sheds into thy crystal cup.
Thou art the nurse of Virtue. In thine arms
She smiles, appearing, as in truth she is,
Heaven-born, and destined to the skies again.      50
Thou art not known where Pleasure is adored,
That reeling goddess with the zoneless waist
And wandering eyes, still leaning on the arm
Of Novelty, her fickle, frail support;
E




5~


THE TASK.   11T.


For thou art meek and constant, hating change,     55
And finding in the calm of truth-tried love
Joys that her stormy raptures never yield.
Forsaking thee, what shipwreck have we made
Of honour, dignity, and fair renown!
Till prostitution elbows us aside                  60 o
In all our crowded streets; and senates seem
Convened for purposes of empire less
Than to release the adultress from her bond.
The adultress! what a theme for angry verse I
What provocation to the indignant heart,           65
That feels for injured love! but I disdain
The nauseous task to paint her as she is,
Cruel, abandoned, glorying in her shame!
No:-let her pass, and charioted along
In guilty splendour, shake the public ways;        70
The frequency of crimes has washed them white,
And verse of mine shall never brand the wretch,
Whom matrons now, of character unsmirched
And chaste themselves, are not ashamed to own.
Virtue and vice had boundaries in old time,        75
Not to be passed: and she that had renounced
Her sex's honour, was renounced herself
By all that prized it; not for prudery's sake,
But dignity's, resentful of the wrong.
'Twas hard perhaps on here and there a waif        80
Desirous to return, and not received,
But was a wholesome rigour in the main,
And taught the unblemished to preserve with care
That purity, whose loss was loss of all.
Men too were nice in honour in those days,         85
And judged offenders well. Then he that sharped,
And pocketed a prize by fraud obtained,
Was marked and shunned as odious. He that sold
His country, or was slack when she required
His every nerve in action and.at stretch,         90
Paid with the blood that he had basely spared,
The price of his default. But now-yes, now,




-THE GARDEN.


Sl'


We are become so candid and so fair,
So liberal in construction, and so rich
In Christian charity, (good-natured age!)            95
That they are safe, sinners of either sex,
Transgress what laws they may. Well-dressed, well-bred,
IsWell-equipaged, is ticket good enough
To pass us readily through every door.
Hypocrisy, detest her as we may,                    joo
(And no man's hatred ever wronged her yet)
May claim this merit still-that she admits
The worth of what she mimics with such care,
And thus gives Virtue indirect applause;
But she has burned her mask, not needed here,       I05
Where Vice has such allowance, that her shifts
And specious semblances have lost their use.,   I was a stricken deer that left the herd
'Long since: with many an arrow deep infixed
My panting side was charged, when I withdrew        110
To seek a tranquil death in distant shades.
There was I found by One who had himself
Been hurt by the archers. In his side He bore,
And in his hands and feet, the cruel scars.
With gentle force soliciting the darts,             115
He drew them forth, and healed, and bade me live.
Since then, with few associates, in remote
And silent woods I wander, far from those
My former partners of the peopled scene;
With few associates, and not wishing more.          120
Here much I ruminate, as much I may,
With other views of men and manners now
Than once, and others of a life to come,
I see that all are wanderers, gone astray
Each in his own delusions; they are lost            125
In chase of fancied happiness, still wooed
And never won. Dream after dream ensues,
And still they dream that they shall still succeed,
\ And still are disappointed. Rings the world
With the vain stir. I sum up half mankind,          130




52


THE TASK. III.


And add two-thirds of the remainder-half,
And find the total of their hopes and fears
Dreams, empty dreams. The million flit as gay
As if created only like the fly
That spreads his motley wings in the eye of noon,   135j
To sport their season, and be seen no more.
The rest are sober dreamers, grave and wise,
And pregnant with discoveries new and rare.
Some write a narrative of wars and feats
Of heroes little known, and call the rant           140
A history: describe the man, of whom
His own coevals took but little note,
And paint his person, character and views,
As they had known him from his mother's womb.
They disentangle from the puzzled skein,            145
In which obscurity has wrapped them up,
The threads of politic and shrewd design
That ran through all his purposes, and charge
His mind with meanings that he never had,
Or having, kept concealed. Some drill and bore      150
The solid earth, and from the strata there
Extract a register, by which we learn,
That He who made it, and revealed its date
To Moses, was mistaken in its age.
Some,,more acute and more industrious still,        155
Contrive creation; travel nature up
To the sharp peak of her sublimest height,
And tell us whence the stars; why some are fixed,
And planetary some; what gave them first
Rotation; from what fountain flowed their light.    i6o
Great contest follows, and much learned dust
Involves the combatants; each claiming Truth,
And Truth disclaiming both; and thus they spend
The little wick of life's poor shallow lamp,
In playing tricks with Nature, giving laws          165
To distant worlds, and trifling inftheir own.
Is 't not a pity now, that tickling rheums
Should ever tease 'the lungs and blear the sight




THE GARDEN.


53


Of oracles like these? Great pity too,
That having wielded th' elements, and built       I70
A thousand systems, each in his own way,
They should go out in fume, and be forgot?
Ah! what is life thus spent? and what are they
'   ~t frantic who thus spend it all for smoke?
/Eternity for bubbles proves at last               175
A senseless bargain. When I see such games
Played by the creatures of a Power who swears
That He will judge the earth, and call the fool
To a sharp reckoning that has lived in vain;
And when I weigh this seeming wisdom well,        I80
And prove it in the infallible result
So hollow and so false-I feel my heart
Dissolve in pity, and account the learn'd,
If this be learning, most of all deceived.
Great crimes alarm the Conscience, but it sleeps  185
While thoughtful man is plausibly amused.
'Defend me therefore, Common Sense,' say I,
'From reveries so airy, from the toil
Of dropping buckets into empty wells,
And growing old in drawing nothing up!'           I90
"Twere well,' says one sage, erudite, profound,
Terribly arched and aquiline his nose,
And overbuilt with most impending brows,
"Twere well, could you permit the world to live
As the world pleases. What's the world to you?'   195
Much. I was born of woman, and drew milk
As sweet as charity from human breasts.
I think, articulate, I laugh and weep,
And exercise all functions of a man.
How then should I and any man that lives          200
Be strangers to each other? Pierce my vein,
Take of the crimson stream meandering there,
And catechise it well; apply your glass,
Search it, and prove now if it be not blood
Congenial with thine own; and if it be,           205
What edge of subtlety canst thou suppose




54


THE TASK. III.


Keen enough, wise and skilful as thou art,
To cut the link of brotherhood, by which
One common Maker bound me to the kind?
True, I am no proficient, I confess,              2IO
In arts like yours. I cannot call the swift
And perilous lightnings from the, angry clouds,
And bid them hide themselves in earth beneath;
I cannot analyse the air, nor catch
The parallax of yonder luminous point             21
That seems half quenched in the immense abyss;
Such powers I boast not-neither can I rest
A silent witness of the headlong rage,
Or heedless folly, by which thousands die,
Bone of my bone, and kindred souls to mine.       220
God never meant that man should scale the Heavens
1By strides of human wisdom. In his works,
Though wondrous, He commands us, in his word,
To seek him rather where his mercy shines.
The mind indeed, enlightened from above,          225
Views him in all; ascribes to the grand cause
The grand effect; acknowledges with joy
His manner, and with rapture tastes his style.
But never yet did philosophic tube,
That brings the planets home into the eye         230
Of Observation, and discovers, else
Not visible, his family of worlds,
Discover him that rules them; such a veil
Hangs over mortal eyes, blind from the birth,
And dark in things divine. t Full often too       235
Our wayward intellect, the -       learn
Of_*N-ature, overlooks her author.moe
F    if~t~rumental causes proud to draw
Conclusion retrograde, and mad mistake.
But if his word once teach us, shoot a ray        240
Through all the heart's dark chambers, and reveal
Truths undiscerned but by that holy light,
Then all is plain. Philosophy baptized
In the pure fountain of eternal love




MHE GARDEN.                    55
Has eyes indeed; and viewing all she sees         245
As meant to indicate a God to man,
Gives him his praise, and forfeits not her own.
Learning has borne such fruit in other days
On all her branches. Piety has found
Friends in the friends of science, and true prayer  250
Has flowed from lips wet with Castalian dews.
Such was thy wisdom, Newton, childlike sage!
Sagacious reader of the works of God,
And in his word sagacious. Such too thine,
Milton, whose genius had angelic wings,           255
And fed on manna. And such thine, in whom
Our British Themis gloried with just cause,
Immortal Hale! for deep discernment praised,
And sound integrity, not more than famed
For sanctity of manners undefiled.                260
All flesh is grass, and all its glory fades
Like the fair flower dishevelled in the wind;
Riches have wings, and grandeur is a dream.
he man we celebrate must find a tomb,
And we that worship him, ignoble graves.          265
Nothing is proof against the general curse
Of vanity, that seizes all below.
The only amaranthine flower on earth
Is virtue; the only lasting treasure, truth.
But what is truth? 'Twas Pilate's question put    270
To Truth itself, that deigned him no reply.
And wherefore? Will not God impart his light
To them that ask it?-Freely.-'Tis his joy,
His glory, and his nature to impart;
But to the proud, uncandid, insincere,            275
Or negligent inquirer, not a spark.
What's that which brings contempt upon a book,
And him that writes it, though the style be neat,
The method clear, and argument exact?
That makes a minister in holy things              280
The joy of many, and the dread of more,
His name a theme for praise and for reproach?




56


THE TASK. III.


That, while it gives us worth in God's account,
Depreciates and undoes us in our own?
What pearl is it that rich men cannot buy,        285
That learning is too proud to gather up,
But which the poor, and the despised of all,
Seek and obtain, and often find unsought?
Tell me-and I will tell thee what is Truth.
Oh friendly to the best pursuits of man,        290
Friendly to thought, to virtue, and to peace,
Domestic life in rural leisure passed!
Few know thy value, and few taste thy sweets,
Though many boast thy favours, and affect
To understand and choose thee for their own.      295
But foolish man foregoes his proper bliss,
Even as his first progenitor, and quits,
Though placed in Paradise, (for earth has still
Some traces of her youthful beauty left)
Substantial happiness for transient joy.          300
Scenes formed for contemplation, and to nurse
The growing seeds of wisdom; that suggest,
By every pleasing image they present,
Reflections such as meliorate the heart,
Compose the passions, and exalt the mind;          305
Scenes such as these, 'tis his supreme delight
To fill with riot, and defile with blood.
Should some contagion, kind to the poor brutes
We persecute, annihilate the tribes
r That draw the sportsman over hill and dale        310
) Fearless, and rapt away from all his cares;
Should never game-fowl hatch her eggs again,
Nor baited hook deceive the fish's eye;
Could pageantry and dance, and feast and song,
Be quelled in all our summer-month retreats;      315
How many self-deluded nymphs and swains,
Who dream they have a taste for fields and groves,
Would find them hideous nurseries of the spleen,
And crowd the roads, impatient for the town!
They love the country, and none else, who seek    320




THE GARDEN.


57


For their own sake its silence and its shade;
Delights which who would leave, that has a heart
Susceptible of pity, or a mind
Cultured and capable of sober thought
For all the savage din of the swift pack,         325
And clamours of the field? Detested sport,
That owes its pleasures to another's pain,
That feeds upon the sobs and dying shrieks
Of harmless Nature, dumb, but yet endued
With eloquence that agonies inspire,              330
Of silent tears and heart-distending sighs!
Vain tears, alas! and sighs that never find
A corresponding tone in jovial souls.
Well-one at least is safe. One sheltered hare
Has never heard the sanguinary yell               335
Of cruel man, exulting in her woes.
Innocent partner of my peaceful home,
Whom ten long years' experience of my care
Has made at last familiar; she has lost
Much of her vigilant instinctive dread,           340
Not needful here, beneath a roof like mine.
Yes-thou may'st eat thy bread, and lick the hand
That feeds thee; thou may'st frolic on the floor
At evening, and at night retire secure
To thy straw couch, and slumber unalarmed;        345
For I have gained thy confidence, have pledged
All that is human in me, to protect
Thine unsuspecting gratitude and love.
If I survive thee, I will dig thy grave;
And when I place thee in it, sighing say,         350
I knew at least one hare that had a friend.
How various his employments whom the world
Calls idle, and who justly, in return,
Esteems that busy world an idler too!
Friends, books, a garden, and perhaps his pen,    355
Delightful industry enjoyed at home,
Wnd Nature in her cultivated trim
pressed to his taste, inviting him ibroad



5-8


THE TA SK. III.


Can he want occupation who has these?
Will he be idle who has much to enjoy?             360
Me, therefore, studious of laborious ease,
Not slothful; happy to deceive the time
Not waste it, and aware that human life
Is but a loan, to be repaid with use,
When He shall call his debtors to account         365
From whom are all our blessings, business finds
Even here: while sedulous I seek to improve,
At least neglect not, or leave unemployed,
The mind He gave me; driving it, though slack
Too oft, and much impeded in its work             370
By causes not to be divulged in vain,
To its just point-the service of mankind.
He that attends to his interior self;
That has a heart, and keeps it; has a mind
That hungers, and supplies it; and who seeks      375
A social, not a dissipated life,
Has business; feels himself engaged to achieve
No unimportant, though a silent task.
A life all turbulence and noise may seem
To him that leads it, wise, and to be praised;    380
'3ut wisdom is a pearl with most success
ought in still water, and beneath clear skies.
He that is ever occupied in storms,
Or dives not for it, or brings up instead,
Vainly industrious, a disgraceful prize.          385
The morning finds the self-sequestered man
Fresh for his task, intend what task he may.
Whether inclement seasons recommend
His warm but simple home, where he enjoys,
With her who shares his pleasures and his heart,   390
Sweet converse, sipping calm the fragrant lymph
Which neatly she prepares; then to his book
Well-chosen, and not sullenly perused
In selfish silence, but imparted oft,
As aught occurs that she may smile to. hear,      395
Or turn to nourishment,' digested well.




THE GARDEN.


59


Or if the garden with its many cares,
All well repaid, demand him, he attends
The welcome call, conscious how much the hand
Of lubbard Labour needs his watchful eye,         400
Oft loitering lazily if not o'erseen,
Or misapplying his unskilful strength.
Nor does he govern only, or direct,
But much performs himself. No works, indeed,
That ask robust, tough sinews, bred to toil,      405
Servile employ; but such as may amuse
Not tire, demanding rather skill than force.
Proud of his well-spread walls, he views his trees,
That meet (no barren interval between)
With pleasure more than even their fruits afford,  410
Which, save himself who trains them, none can feel;
These therefore are his own peculiar charge,
No meaner hand may discipline the shoots,
None but his steel approach them. What is weak,
Distempered, or has lost prolific powers,         415
Impaired by age, his unrelenting hand
Dooms to the knife; nor does he spare the soft
And succulent, that feeds its giant growth
But barren, at the expense of neighbouring twigs
Less ostentatious, and yet studded thick          420
With hopeful gems. The rest, no portion left
That may disgrace his art, or disappoint
Large expectation, he disposes neat
At measured distances, that air and sun
Admitted freely, may afford their aid,            425
And ventilate and warm the swelling buds.
Hence Summer has her riches, Autumn hence,
And hence even Winter fills his withered hand
With blushing fruits, and plenty not his own.
Fair recompense of labour well bestowed,          430
And wise precaution, which a clime so rude
Makes needful still; whose Spring is but the child
Of churlish Winter, in her froward moods
Discovering much the temper of her sire.




60


THE TASK. III.


'For oft, as if in her the stream of mild           435
Maternal nature had reversed its course,
She brings her infants forth with many smiles,
But, once delivered, kills them with a frown.
He, therefore, timely warned, himself supplies
Her want of care, screening and keeping warm      440
The plenteous bloom, that no rough blast may sweep
His garlands from the boughs. Again, as oft
As the sun peeps, and vernal airs breathe mild,
The fence withdrawn, he gives them every beam,
And spreads his hopes before the blaze of day.    445
To raise the prickly and green-coated gourd,
So grateful to the palate, and when rare
So coveted, else base and disesteemedFood for the vulgar merely-is an art
That toiling ages have, but just matured,         450
And at this moment unassayed in song.
Yet gnats have had, and frogs and mice, long since,
Their eulogy; those sang the Mantuan bard,
And these the Grecian, in ennobling strains;
And in thy numbers, Phillips, shines for aye      455
The solitary Shilling. Pardon then,
Ye sage dispensers of poetic fame,
The ambition of one meaner far, whose powers,
Presuming an attempt not less sublime,
Pant for the praise of dressing to the taste      460
Of critic appetite, no sordid fare,
A cucumber, while costly yet and scarce.
The stable yields a stercoraceous heap,
/Impregnated with quick fermenting salts,
And potent to resist the freezing blast;          465
For ere the beech and elm have cast their leaf
Deciduous, and when now November dark
Checks vegetation in the torpid plant
Exposed to his cold breath, the task begins.
Warily therefore, and with prudent heed,           470
He seeks a favoured spot; that where he builds
The agglomerated pile, his frame may front




THE GARDEN.


The sun's meridian disk, and at the back
Enjoy close shelter, wall, or reeds, or hedge
Impervious to the wind. First he bids spread       475
Dry fern or littered hay, that may imbibe
The ascending damps; then leisurely impose,
And lightly, shaking it with agile hand
From the full fork, the saturated straw.
What longest binds the closest, forms secure        480
The shapely side, that as it rises takes,
By just degrees, an overhanging breadth,
Sheltering the base with its projected eaves.
The uplifted frame, compact at every joint,
And overlaid with clear translucent glass,          485
He settles next upon the sloping mount,
Whose sharp declivity shoots off secure
From the dashed pane the deluge as it falls:
He shuts it close, and the first labour ends.
Thrice must the voluble and restless earth          490
Spin round upon her axle, ere the warmth,
Slow gathering in the midst, through the square mass
Diffused, attain the surface; when, behold!
A pestilent and most corrosive steam,
Like a gross fog Boeotian, rising fast,             495
And fast condensed upon the dewy sash,
Asks egress; which obtained, the overcharged
And drenched conservatory breathes abroad,
In volumes wheeling slow, the vapour dank,
And purified, rejoices to have lost                 500
Its foul inhabitant. But to assuage
The impatient fervour which it first conceives
Within its reeking bosom, threatening death
To his young hopes, requires discreet delay.
Experience, slow preceptress, teaching oft          505
The way to glory by miscarriage foul,
Must prompt him, and admonish how to catch
The auspicious moment, when the tempered heat
Friendly to vital motion, may afford
Soft fomentation, and invite the seed.              510




TME TA SK. 111.


The seed, selected wisely, plump, and smooth,
And glossy, he commits to pots of size
Diminutive, well filled with well-prepared
And fruitful soil, that has been treasured long,
And drunk no moisture from the dripping clouds.   515
These on the warm and genial earth that hides
The smoking manure, and overspreads it all,
He places lightly, and as time subdues
The rage of fermentation, plunges deep,
In the soft medium, till they stand immersed.     520
Then rise the tender germs, upstarting quick
And spreading wide their spongy lobes, at first
Pale, wan, and livid, but assuming soon,
If fanned by balmy and nutritious air,
Strained through the friendly mats, a vivid green.  525
Two leaves produced, two rough indented leaves,
Cautious he pinches from the second stalk
A pimple that portends a future sprout,
And interdicts its growth. Thence straight succeed
The branches, sturdy to his utmost wish,          530
Prolific all, and harbingers of more.
The crowded roots demand enlargement now,
And transplantation in an ampler space.
Indulged in what they wish, they soon supply
Large foliage, overshadowing golden flowers,      535
Blown on the summit of the apparent fruit.
These have their sexes; and when summer shines,
The bee transports the fertilizing meal
From flower to flower, and even the breathing air
Wafts the rich prize to its appointed use.        540
Not so when winter scowls. Assistant Art
Then acts in Nature's office, brings to pass
The glad espousals, and ensures the crop.
Grudge not, ye rich, (sinfce Luxury must have
His dainties, and the World's more numerous half  545
Lives by contriving delicates for you)
Grudge not the cost. Ye little know the cares,
The vigilance, the labour, and the skill,




THE GARDEN.6


~63


That day and night are exercised, and hang
Upon the ticklish balance of suspense,            550
That ye may garnish your profuse regales
With summer fruits, brought forth by wintry suns.
Ten thousand dangers lie in wait to thwart
The process. Heat and cold, and wind and steam,
Moisture and drought, mice, worms, and swarming flies 555
Minute as dust and numberless, oft work
Dire disappointment that admits no cure,
And which no care can obviate. It were long,
Too long, to tell the expedients and the shifts
Which he that fights a season so severe           56o
Devises, while he guards his tender trust,
And oft at last in vain. The learned and wise,
Sarcastic, would exclaim, and judge the song
Cold as its theme, and like its theme the fruit
Of too much labour, worthless when produced.      565
Who loves a garden loves a greenhouse too.
Unconscious of a less propitious clime,
There blooms exotic beauty, warm and snug,
While the winds whistle, and the snows descend.
The spiry myrtle with unwithering leaf            570
Shines there, and flourishes. The golden boast
Of Portugal and Western India there,
The ruddier orange and the paler lime,
Peep through their polished foliage at the storm,
And seem to smile at what they need not fear.     575
The amomum there with intermingling flowers
And cherries hangs her twigs. Geranium boasts
Her crimson honours; and the spangled beau,
Ficoides, glitters bright the winter long.
All plants, of every leaf, that can endure        580
The winter's frown, if screened from his shrewd bite,
Live there, and prosper. Those Ausonia claims,
Levantine regions these, the Azores send
Their jessamine, her jessamine remote
Caffreia; foreigners from many lands,             585
They form one social shade, as if convened




64


THE TASK. llT.


By magic summons of the Orphean lyre.
Yet just arrangement, rarely brought to pass
But by a master's hand, disposing well
The gay diversities of leaf and flower,            590
Must lend its aid to illustrate all their charms,
And dress the regular yet various scene.
Plant behind plant aspiring, in the van
The dwarfish, in the rear retired, but still
Sublime above the rest, the statelier stand.       595
So once were ranged the sons of ancient Rome,
A noble show! while Roscius trod the stage;
And so, while Garrick, as renowned as he,
The sons of Albion; fearing each to lose
Some note of Nature's music from his lips,         6oo
And covetous of Shakespeare's beauty, seen
In every flash of his far-beaming eye.
Nor taste alone and well-contrived display
Suffice to give the marshalled ranks the grace
Of their complete effect. Much yet remains         605
Unsung, and many cares are yet behind,
And more laborious; cares on which depends
Their vigour, injured soon, not soon restored.
The soil must be renewed, which often washed,
Loses its treasure of salubrious salts,            6i0
And disappoints the roots; the slender roots
Close interwoven, where they meet the vase,
Must smooth be shorn away; the sapless branch
Must fly before the knife; the withered leaf
Must be detached, and where it strews the floor,   615
Swept with a woman's neatness, breeding else
Contagion, and disseminating death.
Discharge but these kind offices, (and who
Would spare, that loves them, offices like these?)
Well they reward the toil. The sight is pleased,   620
The scent regaled, each odoriferous leaf,
Each opening blossom, freely breathes abroad
Its gratitude, and thanks him with its sweets.
So manifold, all pleasing in their kind,




THE GARDEN.                    65
All healthful, are the employs of rural life      625
Reiterated as the wheel of time
Runs round; still ending, and beginning still.
Nor are these all. To deck the shapely knoll,
That softly swelled and gaily dressed appears
A flowery island, from the dark green lawn        630
Emerging, must be deemed a labour due
To no mean hand, and asks the touch of taste.
Here also grateful mixture of well matched
And sorted hues (each giving each relief,
And by contrasted beauty shining more)            635
Is needful. Strength may wield the ponderous spade,
May turn the clod, and wheel the compost home,
But elegance, chief grace the garden shows,
And most attractive, is the fair result
Of thought, the creature of a polished mind.      640
Without it, all is gothic as the scene
To which the insipid citizen resorts
Near yonder heath; where Industry mispent,
But proud of his uncouth ill-chosen task,
Has made a Heaven on earth; with suns and moons   645
Of close-rammed stones has charged the encumbered soil,
And fairly laid the zodiac in the dust.
He, therefore, who would see his flowers disposed
Sightly, and in just order, ere he gives
The beds the trusted treasure of their seeds,     650
Forecasts the future whole; that when the scene
Shall break into its preconceived display,
Each for itself, and all as with one voice
Conspiring, may attest his bright design.
Nor even then, dismissing as performed            655
His pleasant work, may he suppose it done.
Few self-supported flowers endure the wind
Uninjured, but expect the upholding aid
Of the smooth-shaven prop, and neatly tied,
Are wedded thus, like beauty to old age,          660
For interest sake, the living to the dead.
Some clothe the soil that feeds them, far diffused
VOL. II.                F


*>




66


THE TASK. 111.


And lowly creeping, modest and yet fair,
Like virtue thriving most where little seen;
Some, more aspiring, catch the neighbour shrub    665
With clasping tendrils, and invest his branch,
Else unadorned, with many a gay festoon
And fragrant chaplet, recompensing well
The strength they borrow with the grace they lend.
All hate the rank society of weedsfs 670
Noisome, and ever greedy to exhaust
The impoverished earth; an overbearing race
That, like the multitude made faction-mad,
Disturb good order, and degrade true worth.
-Oh blest seclusion from a jarring world,         675
Which he, thus occupied, enjoys! Retreat
Cannot indeed to guilty man restore
Lost innocence, or cancel follies past,
But it has peace, and much secures the mind
From all assaults of evil, proving still          680
A faithful barrier, not o'erleaped with ease
By vicious Custom, raging uncontrolled
Abroad, and desolating public life.
When fierce Temptation, seconded within
By traitor Appetite, and armed with darts         685
Tempered in hell, invades the throbbing breast,
To combat may be glorious, and success
Perhaps may crown us, but to fly is safe.
Had I thechoice of sublunary good,
What could I wish, that I possess not here?       690
Health, leisure, means to improve it, friendship, peace,
No loose or wanton, though a wandering Muse,
And constant occupation without care.
Thus blest, I draw a picture of that bliss;
Hopeless indeed that dissipated minds,            695
And profligate abusers of a world
Created fair so much in vain for them,
Should seek the guiltless joys that I describe,
Allured by my report: but sure no less,
That self-condemned they must neglect the prize,  700




THE GARDEN.


67


And what they will not taste must yet approve.
What weAadmire we praise, and when we praise,
Advance it into notice, that its worth
Acknowledged, others may admire it too.
I therefore recommend, though at the risk         705
Of popular disgust, yet boldly still,
The cause of piety, and sacred truth
And virtue, and those scenes which God ordained
Should best secure them, and promote them most;
Scenes that I love, and with regret perceive      710
Forsaken, or through folly not enjoyed.
Pure is the nymph, though liberal of her smiles,
And chaste, though unconfined, whom I extol.
Not as the prince in Shushan, when he called,
Vainglorious of her charms, his Vashti forth,     715
To grace the full pavilion. His design
Was but to boast his own peculiar good,
Which all might view with envy, none partake.
My charmer is not mine alone; my sweets,
And she that sweetens all my bitters too,         720
Nature, enchanting Nature, in whose form
And lineaments divine I trace a hand
That errs not, and find raptures still renewed,
Is free to all men-universal prize.
Strange that so fair a creature should yet want   725
Admirers, and be destined to divide
With meaner objects even the few she finds!
Stripped of her ornaments, her leaves, and flowers,
She loses all her influence. Cities then
Attract us, and neglected Nature pines,           730
Abandoned as unworthy of our love.
But are not wholesome airs, though unperfumed
By roses, and clear suns though scarcely felt,
And groves, if unharmonious yet secure
From clamour, and whose very silence charms,      735
To be preferred to smoke, to the eclipse
That metropolitan volcanoes make,
Whose Stygian throats breathe darkness all day long;




68


THE TASK. III.


And to the stir of Commerce, driving slow,
And thundering loud, with his ten thousand wheels?  740
They would be, were not madness in the head,
And folly in the heart; were England now
What England was, plain, hospitable, kind,
And undebauched. But we have bid farewell
To all the virtues of those better days,          745
And all their honest pleasures. Mansions once
Knew their own masters, and laborious hinds,
That had survived the father, served the son.
Now the legitimate and rightful lord
Is but a transient guest, newly arrived           750
And soon to be supplanted. He that saw
His patrimonial timber cast its leaf,
Sells the last scantling, and transfers the price
To some shrewd sharper, ere it buds again.
Estates are landscapes, gazed upon awhile,        755
Then advertised, and auctioneered away.
The country starves, and they that feed the overcharged
And surfeited lewd town with her fair dues,
By a just judgment strip and starve themselves.
The wings that waft our riches out of sight       760
Grow on the gamester's elbows, and the alert
And nimble motion of those restless joints
That never tire, soon fans them all away.
Improvement too, the idol of the age,
Is fed with many a victim. Lo! he comes;-         765
The omnipotent magician, Brown, appears!
Down falls the venerable pile, the abode
Of our forefathers-a grave, whiskered race,
But tasteless. Springs a palace in its stead,
But in a distant spot, where, more exposed,       770
It may enjoy the advantage of the north
And aguish east, till time shall have transformed
Those naked acres to a sheltering grove.
He speaks. The lake in front becomes a lawn,
Woods vanish, hills subside, and valleys rise,    775
And streams, as if created for his use,




THE GARDEN.


69


Pursue the track of his directing wand,
Sinuous or straight, now rapid and now slow,
Now murmuring soft, now roaring in cascades,
Even as he bids! The enraptured owner smiles.      780
'Tis finished, and yet, finished as it seems,
Still wants a grace, the loveliest it could show,
A mine to satisfy the enormous cost.
Drained to the last poor item of his wealth,
He sighs, departs, and leaves the accomplished plan,  785
That he has touched, retouched, many a long day
Laboured, and many a night pursued in dreams,
Just when it meets his hopes, and proves the Heaven
He wanted, for a wealthier to enjoy!
And now perhaps the glorious hour is come,         790
When having no stake left, no pledge to endear
Her interests, or that gives her sacred cause
A moment's operation on his love,
He burns with most intense and flagrant zeal
To serve his country. Ministerial grace            795
Deals him out money from the public chest;
Or if that mine be shut, some private purse
Supplies his need with a usurious loan,
To be refunded duly, when his vote
Well-managed shall have earned its worthy price.    800
Oh innocent, compared with arts like these,
Crape and cocked pistol, and the whistling ball
Sent through the traveller's temples! He that finds
One drop of Heaven's sweet mercy in his cup,
Can dig, beg, rot, and perish, well content,       805
So he may wrap himself in honest rags
At his last gasp; but could not for a world
Fish up his dirty and dependent bread
From pools and ditches of the commonwealth,
Sordid and sickening at his own success.           810
Ambition, Avarice, Penury incurred
By endless riot, Vanity, the Lust
Of pleasure and variety, dispatch,
As duly as the swallows disappear,




no


THE TASK. III.


The world of wandering knights and squires to town. 815
London engulphs them all! The shark is there,
And the shark's prey; the spendthrift, and the leech
That sucks him; there the sycophant, and he
Who, with bare-headed and obsequious bows,
Begs a warm office, doomed to a cold jail         820
And groat per diem, if his patron frown.
The levee swarms, as if in golden pomp
Were charactered on every statesman's door,
' Battered and bankrupt fortunes mended here.'
These are the charms that sully and eclipse       82 5
The charms of Nature. 'Tis the cruel gripe
That lean hard-handed Poverty inflicts,
The hope of better things, the chance to whin,
The wish to shine, the thirst to be amused,
That at the sound of Winter's hoary wing          830
Unpeople all our counties of such herds
Of fluttering, loitering, cringing, begging, loose
And wanton vagrants, as make London, vast
And boundless as it is, a crowded coop.
Oh thou resort and mart of all the earth,       835
Chequered with all complexions of mankind,
And spotted with all crimes; in whom I see
Much that I love, and more that I admire,
And all that I abhor; thou freckled fair
That pleasest and yet shock'st me; I can laugh,   840
And I can weep, can hope, and can despond,
Feel wrath and pity, when I think on thee!
Ten righteous would have saved a city once,
And thou hast many righteous.-Well for thee!
That salt preserves thee; more corrupted else,    845
And therefore more obnoxious at this hour,
Than Sodom iri her day had power to be,
For whom God heard his Abraham plead in vain.




BOOK IV.
THE WINTER EVENING.
ARGUMENT:-The post comes in, I-The newspaper is read, $36-The
world contemplated at a distance, 88-Address to Winter, 120-The
rural amusements of a Winter evening compared with the fashionable
ones, 193-Address to Evening, 243-A brown study, 267-Fall of
snow in the evening, 302-The waggoner, 330-A poor family piece,
374-The rural thief, 429-Public houses, 466-The multitude of them
censured, 500-The farmer's daughter, what she was, 513-What she
is, 534-The simplicity of country manners almost lost, 553-Causes of
the change, 576-Desertion of the country by the rich, 587-Neglect of
magistrates, 593-The militia principally in fault, 613-The new
recruit and his transformation, 623-Reflections on bodies corporate,
659-The love of rural objects natural to all, and never to be totally
extinguished, 69I.
HARK! 'tis the twanging horn! O'er yonder bridge
That with its wearisome but needful length
Bestrides the wintry flood, in which the moon
Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright,
He comes, the herald of a noisy world,                      5
With spattered boots, strapped waist, and frozen locks,
News from   all nations lumbering at his back.
True to his charge, the close-packed load behind,
Yet careless what he brings, his one concern
Is to conduct it to the destined inn,                     Io
And, having dropped the expected bag, pass on.
He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch,
Cold and yet cheerful; messenger of grief
Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some;
To him indifferent whether grief or joy.                   15
Houses in ashes, and the fall of stocks,




72


THE TASK. IV.


Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet
With tears that trickled down the writer's cheeks
Fast as the periods from his fluent quill,
Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains,     20
Or nymphs responsive, equally affect
His horse and him, unconscious of them all.
But oh the important budget! ushered in
With such heart-shaking music, who can say
What are its tidings? Have our troops awaked?        25
Or do they still, as if with opium drugged,
Snore to the murmurs of the Atlantic wave?
Is India free? And does she wear her plumed
And jewelled turban with a smile of peace?
Or do we grind her still? The grand debate,         30
The popular harangue, the tart reply,
The logic, and the wisdom, and the wit,
And the loud laugh-I long to know them all;
I burn to set the imprisoned wranglers free,
And give them voice and utterance once again.        35
Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast,
Let fall the curtains, wheel the ofa round,
And while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn
Throws up a steamy column, and the cups
IThat cheer but not inebriate,)Wait on each,         40
So let us welcome peaceful evening in.
Not such his evening, who with shining face
Sweats in the crowded theatre, and squeezed
And bored with elbow-points through both his sides,
Outscolds the ranting actor on the stage:            45
Nor his, who patient stands till his feet throb
And his head thumps, to feed upon the breath
Of patriots bursting with heroic rage,
Or placemen all tranquillity and smiles.
This folio of four pages, happy work!                50
Which not even critics criticise; that holds
Inquisitive attention, while I read,
Fast bound in chains of silence, which the fair,
Though eloquent themselves, yet fear to break;




THE WINTER EVENING.                  73
What is it, but a map of busy life,                 55
Its fluctuations, and its vast concerns?
Here runs the mountainous and craggy ridge
That tempts Ambition. On the summit, see
The seals of office glitter in his eyes;
He climbs, he pants, he grasps them! At his heels,  60
Close at his heels, a demagogue ascends,
And with a dexterous jerk soon twists him down,
And wins them, but to lose them in his turn.
Here rills of oily eloquence in soft
Meanders lubricate the course they take;            65
The modest speaker is ashamed and grieved
To engross a moment's notice, and yet begs,
Begs a propitious ear for his poor thoughts,
However trivial all that he conceives.
Sweet bashfulness! it claims at least this praise;  70
The dearth of information and good sense
That it foretells us, always comes to pass.
Cataracts of declamation thunder here,
There forests of no meaning spread the page,
In which all comprehension wanders lost;            75
While fields of pleasantry amuse us there
With merry descants on a nation's woes.
The rest appears a wilderness of strange
But gay confusion; roses for the cheeks
And lilies for the brows of faded age,              80
Teeth for the toothless, ringlets for the bald,
Heaven, earth, and ocean, plundered of their sweets,
Nectareous essences, Olympian dews,
Sermons, and city feasts, and favourite airs,
3Ethereal journeys, submarine exploits,              85
And Katterfelto, with his hair on end
At his own wonders, wondering for his bread.
'Tis pleasant through the loopholes of retreat
To peep at such a world; to see the stir
Of the great Babel, and not feel the crowd;         9o
To hear the roar she sends through all her gates
At a safe distance, where the dying sound




74


THE TASK. IV.


Falls a soft murmur on the uninjured ear.
Thus sitting, and surveying thus at ease
The globe and its concerns, I seem advanced         95
To some secure and more than mortal height,
That liberates and exempts me from them all.
It turns submitted to my view, turns round
With all its generations; I behold
The tumult, and am still. The sound of war          o00
Has lost its terrors ere it reaches me;
Grieves, but alarms me not. I mourn the pride
And avarice that make man a wolf to man;
Hear the faint echo of those brazen throats
By which he speaks the language of his heart,       105
And sigh, but never tremble at the sound.
He travels and expatiates, as the bee
From flower to flower, so he from land to land;
The manners, customs, policy of all
Pay contribution to the store he gleans;           rio
He sucks intelligence in every clime,
And spreads the honey of his deep research
At his return, a rich repast for me.
He travels, and I too. I tread his deck,
Ascend his topmast, through his peering eyes        115
Discover countries, with a kindred heart
Suffer his woes and share in his escapes;
While fancy, like the finger of a clock,
Runs-the great circuit, and is still at home.
O Winter, ruler of the inverted year,             120
Thy scattered hair with sleet like ashes filled,
Thy breath congealed upon thy lips, thy cheeks
Fringed with a beard made white with other snows
Than those of age, thy forehead wrapped in clouds,
A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne       125
A sliding car, indebted to no wheels,
But urged by storms along its slippery way;
I love thee, all unlovely as thou seemest,
And dreaded as thou art! Thou holdest the sun
A prisoner in the yet undawning east,               130




THE WINTER E VENING.


75S


Shortening his journey between morn and noon,
And hurrying him, impatient of his stay,
Down to the rosy west;)but kindly still
Compensating his loss with added hours
Of social `converse and instructive ease,         135
And gathering, at short notice, in one group,
The family dispersed, and fixing thought,
Not less dispersed by daylight and its cares.
I crown thee king of intimate delights,
Fireside enjoyments, homeborn happiness,          140
And all the comforts that the lowly roof
Of undisturbed Retirement, and the hours
Of lofg uninterrupted evening know
No rattling wheels stop short befre these gates;
No powdered pert proficient in the art            145
Of sounding an alarm assaults these doors
Till the street rings; no stationary steeds
Cough their own knell, while, heedless of the sound,
The silent circle fan themselves, and quake;
But here the'needle plies its busy task,          150
The pattern grows, the well-depicted flower,
Wrought patiently into the snowy lawn,
Unfolds its bosom; buds, and leaves, and sprigs,
And curling tendrils, gracefully disposed,
Follow the nimble finger of the fair;             155
A wreath that cannot fade, of flowers that blow
With most success when all besides decay.
The poet's or historian's page, by one
Made vocal for the amusement of the rest;
The sprightly lyre, whose treasure of sweet sounds  i6o
The touch from many a trembling chord shakes out;
And the clear voice, symphonious yet distinct,
And in the charming strife triumphant still,
Beguile the night, and set a keener edge
On female industry; the threaded steel            x65
Flies swiftly, and unfelt the task proceeds.
The volume closed, the customary rites
Of the last meal commence. A Roman meal,




76                THE TASK.     IV.
Such as the mistress of the world once found
Delicious, when her patriots of high note,        170
Perhaps by moonlight, at their humble doors,
And under an old oak's domestic shade,
Enjoyed, spare feast! a radish and an egg.
Discourse ensues, not trivial, yet not dull,
Nor such as with a frown forbids the play         I75
Of fancy, or proscribes the sound of mirth:
Nor do we madly, like an impious world,
Who deem religion frenzy, and the God
That made them an intruder on their joys,
Start at his awful name, or deem his praise       I80
A jarring note. Themes of a graver tone,
Exciting oft our gratitude and love,
While we retrace with Memory's pointing wand,
That calls the past to our exact review,
The dangers we have 'scaped, the broken snare,    185
The disappointed foe, deliverance found
Unlooked for, life preserved, and peace restored,
Fruits of omnipotent, eternal love.
'O evenings worthy of the gods!' exclaimed
The Sabine bard. O evenings, I reply,             I90
More to be prized and coveted than yours,
As more illumined, and with nobler truths,
That I, and mine, and those we love, enmoy.
(Is winter hideous in a garb like this?
Neds he the tragic fur, the smoke of lanps,       i95
The pent-up breath of an unsavoury throng,
To thaw him into feeling, or the smart
And snappish dialogue, that flippant wits
Call comedy, to prompt him with a smile?
The self-complacent actor, when he views          200
(Stealing a side-long glance at a full house)
The slope of faces from the floor to the roof,
(As if one master-spring controlled them all)
Relaxed into a universal grin,
Sees not a countenance there that speaks of joy   205
Half so refined or so sincere as ours.




THE WINTER E VENING.


77


Cards were superfluous here, with all the tricks
That idleness has ever yet contrived
To fill the void of an unfurnished brain,
To palliate dullness, and give time a shove.      210
Time as he passes us has a dove's wing,
Unsoiled and swift, and of a silken sound,
But the World's Time, is Time in masquerade.
Theirs, should I paint him, has his pinions fledged
With motley plumes, and, where the peacock shows  2I5
His azure eyes, is tinctured black and red,
With spots quadrangular of diamond form,
Ensanlguined hearts, clubs typical of strife,
And spades the emblem of untimely graves.
What should be, and what was an hourglass once,   220
Becomes a dicebox, and, a billiard-mast
Well does the work of his destructive scythe.
Thus decked, he charms a world whom Fashion blinds
To his true worth, most pleased when idle most;
Whose only happy are their wasted hours.          223
Even misses, at whose age their mothers wore
The backstring and the bib, assume the dress
Of womanhood, sit pupils in the school
Of card-devoted Time, and night by night
Placed at some vacant corner of the board,        230
Learn every trick, and soon play all the game.
But truce with censure. Roving as I rove,
Where shall I find an end, or how proceed?
As he that travels far, oft turns aside
To view some rugged rock or mouldering tower,     235
Which seen delights him not; then coming home,
Describes and prints it, that the world may know
How far he went for what was nothing worth;)
So I, with brush in hand and pallet spread,
With colours mixed for a far different use,       240
Paint cards and dolls, and every idle thing
That Fancy finds in her excursive flights.
I   Come, Evening, once again, season of peace;
1 Return, sweet Evening, and continue long!




78


THE TASK. IV.


Methinks I see thee in the streaky west,         245
With matron step slow moving, while the Night
Treads on thy sweeping train; one hand employed
In letting fall the curtain of repose
On bird and beast, the other charged for man
With sweet oblivion of the cares of day:         250
Not sumptuously adorned, nor needing aid,
Like homely-featured Night, of clustering gems;
A star or two, just twinkling on thy brow,
Suffices thee; save that the moon is thine
No less than hers, not worn indeed on high       255
With ostentatious pageantry, but set
With modest grandeur in thy purple zone,
Resplendent less, but of an ampler round.
Come then, and thou shalt find thy votary calm,
Or make me so. Composure is thy gift:            260
And whether I devote thy gentle hours
To books, to music, or the poet's toil;
To weaving nets for bird-alluring fruit;
Or twining silken threads round ivory reels,
When they command whom man was born to please; 265
I slight thee not, but make thee welcome still.
A Just when our drawing rooms begin to blaze
With lights, by clear reflection multiplied
From many a mirror, in which he of Gath,
Goliath, might have seen his giant bulk          270
Whole without stooping, towering crest and all,
My pleasures too begin. But me, perhaps,
The glowing hearth may satisfy awhile
With faint illumination, that uplifts
The shadow to the ceiling, there by fits         275
Dancing uncouthly, to the quivering flame.
Not undelightful is an hour to me
So spent in parlour twilight; such a gloom
Suits well the thoughtful, or unthinking mind,
The mind contemplative, with some new theme      280
Preghant, or indisposed alike to all.
Laugh ye, who boast your more mercurial powers




THE WINTER EV ENING.


79


That never felt a stupor, know no pause,
Nor need one; I am conscious and confess,
Fearless, a soul that does not always think.       285
Me oft has Fancy, ludicrous and wild,
Soothed with a waking dream of houses, towers,
Trees, churches, and strange visages, expressed
In the red cinders, while with poring eye
I gazed, myself creating what 1 saw.               290
Nor less amused, have I quiescent watched
The sooty films that play upon the bars,
Pendulous, and foreboding, in the view
Of swperstition, prophesying still
Though still deceived, some stranger's near approach. 295
'Tis thus the understanding takes repose
In indolent vacuity of thought,
And sleeps and is refreshed. Meanwhile the face
Conceals the mood lethargic with a mask
Of deep deliberation, as the man                   300
Were tasked to his full strength, absorbed and lost.
Thus oft, reclined at ease, I lose an hour
At evening, till at length the freezing blast,
That sweeps the bolted shutter, summons home
The recollected powers, and snapping short         305
The glassy threads with which the Fancy weaves
Her brittle toys, restores me to myself.
How calm is my recess, and how the frost,
Raging abroad, and the rough wind, endear
The silence and the warmth enjoyed within.         31O
I saw the woods and fields at close of day
A variegated show; the meadows green
Though faded; and the lands where lately waved
The glden harvest, of a mellow brown,
Upturned so lately by the forceful share.          315
I saw far off the weedy fallows smile
With verdure not unprofitable, grazed
By flocks, fast feeding and selecting each
His favourite herb; while- all the leafless groves
That skirt the horizon, wore a sable hue,          320




8o


THE TASK. IV.


Scarce notic  in te kin   d.     of eve.
To-morrow brings a change, a total change!
Which even now, though silently performed
And slowly, and by most unfelt, the face
Of universal nature undergoes.                      325
Fast falls a fleecy shower: the downy flakes
Descending, and with never-ceasing lapse
Softly alighting upon all below,
Assimilate all objects. Earth receives
Gladly the thickening mantle, and the green         330
And tender blade, that feared the chilling blast,
Escapes unhurt beneath so warm a veil.
In such a world, so thorny, and where none
Finds happiness unblighted, or if found,
Without some thistly sorrow at its side,            335
It seems the part of wisdom, and no sin
Against the law of love, to measure lots
With less distinguished than ourselves, that thus
We may with patience bear our moderate ills,
And sympathise with others suffering more.          340
111 fares the traveller now, and he that stalks
In ponderous boots beside his reeking team.
The wain goes heavily, impeded sore
By congregated loads adhering close
To the clogged wheels;* and in its sluggish pace    345
Noiseless, appears a moving hill of snow.
The toiling steeds expand the nostril wide,
While every breath, 1y respiration strong
Forced downward, is consolidated soon
Upon their jutting chests. He, formed to bear       350
The pelting brunt of the tempestuous night,
With half-shut eyes, and puckered cheeks, and teeth
Presented bare against the storm, plods on.
One hand secures his hat, save when with both
He brandishes his pliant length of whip,            355
Resounding oft, and never heard in vain.
O happy! and, in my account, denied
That sensibility of pain with which




THE WINTER EVENI1A.G.


81


Refinement is endued, thrice happy thou!
Thy frame, robust and hardy, feels indeed          360(
The piercing cold, but feels it unimpaired.
The learned finger never need explore
Thy vigorous pulse, and the unhealthful East,
That breathes the spleen, and searches every bone
Of the infirm, is wholesome air to thee.           365
Thy days roll on exempt from household care;
Thy waggon is thy wife, and the poor beasts
That drag the dull companion to and fro,
Thine helpless charge, dependent on thy care.
Ah, treat them kindly! rude as thou appearest,     370
Yet show that thou hast mercy, which the great,
With needless hurry whirled from place to place,
Humane as they would seem, not always show.
Poor, yet industrious, modest, quiet, neat,
Such claim compassion in a night like this,        375
And have a friend in every feeling heart.
Warmed, while it lasts, by labour, all day long
They brave the season, and yet find at eve,
Ill-clad and fed but sparely, time to cool.
The frugal housewife trembles when she lights      380
Her scanty stock of brushwood, blazing clear,
But dying soon, like all terrestrial joys.
The few small embers left she nurses well;
And while her infant race, with outspread hands
And crowded knees, sit cowering o'er the sparks,   385
Retires, content to quake, so they be warmed.
The man feels least, as more inured than she
To winter, and the current in his veins
More briskly moved by his severer toil;
Yet he too finds his own distress in theirs.       390
The taper soon extinguished, which I saw
Dangled along at the cold finger's end
Just when the day declined, and the brown loaf
Lodged on the shelf, half-eaten without sauce
Of savoury cheese, or butter costlier still,       395
Sleep seems their only refuge: for, alas!
VOL. II.                G




8a


THE TASK. IV.


Where penury is felt the thought is chainea,
And sweet colloquial pleasures are but few.
With all this thrift they thrive not. All the care
Ingenious Parsimony takes, but just               400
Saves the small inventory, bed and stool,
Skillet and old carved chest, from public sale.
They live, and live without extorted alms
From grudging hands, but other boast have none
To soothe their honest pride, that scorns to beg;  405
Nor comfort else, but in their mutual love.
I praise you much, ye meek and patient pair,
For ye are worthy; choosing rather far
A dry but independent crust, hard earned
And eaten with a sigh, than to endure             410
The rugged frowns and insolent rebuffs
Of knaves in office, partial in the work
Of distribution; liberal of their aid
To clamorous importunity in rags,
But oft-times deaf to suppliants who would blush  415
To wear a tattered garb however coarse,
Whom famine cannot reconcile to filth;
These ask with painful shyness, and, refused
Because deserving, silently retire.
But be ye of good courage. Time itself            420
Shall much befriend you. 'Time shall give increase,
And all your numerous progeny, well trained
But helpless, in few years shall find their hands,
And labour too. Meanwhile ye shall not want
What, conscious of your virtues, we can spare,    425
Nor what a wealthier than ourselves may send.
I mean the man who, when the distant poor
Need help, denies them nothing but his name.
But poverty, with most who whimper forth
Their long complaints, is self-inflicted woe,     430
The effect of laziness or sottish waste.
Now goes the nightly thief prowling abroad
For plunder, much solicitous how best
He may compensate for a day of sloth,




THE WINTER EVENING.                  83
By works of darkness and nocturnal wrong.          435
Woe to the gardener's pale, the farmer's hedge
Plashed neatly, and secured with driven stakes
Deep in the loamy bank. Uptorn by strength,
Resistless in so bad a cause but lame
To better deeds, he bundles up the spoil,           440
An ass's burden, and when laden most
And heaviest, light of foot steals fast away.
Nor does the boarded hovel better guard
The well-stacked pile of riven logs and roots
From his' pernicious force. Nor will he leave      445
Unwrenched the door, however well secured,
Where chanticleer amidst his harem sleeps
In unsuspecting pomp. Twitched from the perch,
He gives the princely bird, with all his wives,
To his voracious bag, struggling in vain,          450
And loudly wondering at the sudden change.
Nor this to feed his own! 'Twere some excuse,
Did pity of their sufferings warp aside
His principle, and tempt him into sin
For their support, so destitute. But they          455
Neglected pine at home, themselves, as more
Exposed than others, with less scruple made
His victims, robbed of their defenceless all.
Cruel is all he does. 'Tis quenchless thirst
Of ruinous ebriety that prompts                    460
His every action, and imbrutes the man.
Oh for a law to noose the villain's neck
Who starves his own, who persecutes the blood
He gave them in his children's veins, and hates
And wrongs the woman he has sworn to love!         465
Pass where we may, through city or through town,
Village or hamlet, of this merry land,
Though lean and beggared, every twentieth pace
Conducts the unguarded nose to such a whiff
Of stale debauch, forth-issuing from the styes     47~
That law has licensed, as makes Temperance reel.
There sit, involved and lost in curling clouds
G 2




84                 THE TA SK.   IV.
Of Indian fume, and guzzling deep, the boor,
The lackey, and the groom; the craftsman there
Takes a Lethean leave of all his toil;             475
Smith, cobbler, joiner, he that plies the shears,
AAd he that kneads the dough; all loud alike,
All learned, and all drunk. The fiddle screams
Plaintive and piteous, as it wept and wailed
Its wasted tones, and harmony unheard:             480
Fierce the dispute whate'er the theme; while she,
Fell Discord, arbitress of such debate,
Perched on the signpost, holds with even hand
Her Indecisive scales. In this she lays
A weight of ignorance; in that, of pride;          485
And smiles delighted with the eternal poise.
Dire is the frequent curse, and its twin sound
The cheek-distending oath, not to be praised
As ornamental, musical, polite,
Like those which modern senators employ,           490
Whose oath is rhetoric, and who swear for fame.
Behold the schools in which plebeian minds,
Once simple, are initiated in arts,
Which some may practise with politer grace,
But none with readier skill!-'Tis here they learn  495
The road that leads from competence and peace
To indigence and rapine; till at last
Society, grown weary of the load,
Shakes her encumbered lap, and casts them out.
But censure profits little: vain the attempt       500
To advertise in verse a public pest,
That like the filth with which the peasant feeds
His hungry acres, stinks and is of use.
The excise is fattened with the rich result
Of all this riot;, and ten thousand casks,         sot
For ever dribbling out their base contents,
Touched by the Midas finger of the state,
Bleed gold for ministers to sport away.
Drink and be mad then; 'tis your country bids!
Gloriously drunk, obey the important call!        510




THE WINTER EVENING.


Her cause demands the assistance of your throats;
Ye all can swallow, and she asks no more.  --
Would I had fallen upon those happier days
That poets celebrate; those golden times
And those Arcadian scenes that Maro sings,         515
And Sidney, warbler of poetic prose.
Nymphs were Dianas then, and swains had hearts
That felt their virtues; Innocence, it seems,
From courts dismissed, found shelter in the groves;
The footsteps of Simplicity, impressed              520
Upon the yielding herbage (so they sing),
Then were not all effaced; then speech profane,
And manners profligate, were rarely found,
Observed as prodigies, and soon reclaimed.
Vain wish! those days were never: airy dreams      525
Sat for the picture; and the poet's hand,
Imparting substance to an empty shade,
Imposed a gay delirium for a truth.
Grant it:-I still must envy them an age
That favoured such a dream, in days like these     530
Impossible, when Virtue is so scarce,
That to suppose a scene where she presides
Is tramontane, and stumbles all belief.
No: we are polished now! The rural lass,
Whom once her virgin modesty and grace,             535
Her artless manners, and her neat attire,
So dignified, that she was hardly less
Than the fair shepherdess of old romance,
Is seen no more. The character is lost!
Her head, adorned with lappets pinned aloft        540
And ribands streaming gay, superbly raised,
And magnified beyond all human size,
Indebted to some smart wig-weaver's hand
For more than half the tresses it sustains;
Her elbows ruffled, and her tottering form         545
Ill propped upon French heels; she might be deemed
(But that the basket dangling on her arm
Interprets her more truly) of a rank




86


THE TASK. IV.


Too proud for dairy work, or sale of eggs.
Expect her soon with footboy at her heels,        550
No longer blushing for her awkward load,
Her train and her umbrella all her care.
The town has tinged the country; and the stain
Appears a spot upon a vestal's robe,
The worse for what it soils. The fashion runs     555
Down into scenes still rural; but, alas,
Scenes rarely graced with rural manners now!
Time was when in the pastoral retreat
The unguarded door was safe; men did not watch
To invade another's right, or guard their own.    560
Then sleep was undisturbed by Fear, unscared
By drunken howlings; and the chilling tale
Of midnight murder was a wonder heard
With doubtful credit, told to frighten babes.
But farewell now to unsuspicious nights,          56
And slumbers unalarmed! Now, ere you sleep,
See that your polished arms be primed with care,
And drop the night-bolt;-ruffians are abroad;
And the first larum of the cock's shrill throat
May prove a trumpet, summoning your ear           570
To horrid sounds of hostile feet within.
Even daylight has its dangers; and the walk
Through pathless wastes and woods, unconscious once
Of other tenants than melodious birds
Or harmless flocks, is hazardous and bold.        575
Lamented change! to which full many a cause
Inveterate, hopeless of a cure, conspires.
The course of human things from good to ill,
From ill to worse, is fatal, never fails.
Increase of power begets increase of wealth;      580
Wealth luxury, and luxury excess;
Excess, the scrofulous and itchy plague
That seizes first the opulent, descends
To the next rank contagious, and in time
Taints downward all the graduated scale           585
Of order, from the chariot to the plough.




THE WINTER EVENAING.


87


The rich, and they that have an arm to check
The licence of the lowest in degree,
Desert their office; and themselves intent
On pleasure, haunt the capital, and thus,         590
To all the violence of lawless hands
Resign the scenes their presence might protect.
Authority herself not seldom sleeps,
Though resident, and witness of the wrong.
The plump convivial parson often bears            595
The magisterial sword in vain, and lays
His reverence and his worship both to rest
On the same cushion of habitual sloth.
Perhaps timidity restrains his arm;
When he should strike, he trembles and sets free,  6oo
Himself enslaved by terror of the band,
The audacious convict, whom he dares not bind.
Perhaps, though by profession ghostly pure,
He too may have his vice, and sometimes prove
Less dainty than becomes his grave outside,       605
In lucrative concerns. Examine well
His milkwhite hand; the palm is hardly clean
But here and there an ugly smutch appears.
Foh! 'twas a bribe that left it: he has touched
Corruption! Whoso seeks an audit here             6xo
Propitious, pays his tribute, game or fish,
Wildfowl or venison, and his errand speeds.
But faster far, and more than all the rest,
A noble cause, which none who bears a spark
Of public virtue ever wished removed,             615
Works the deplored and mischievous effect.
'Tis universal soldiership has stabbed
The heart of merit in the meaner class.
Arms, through the vanity and brainless rage
Of those that bear them, in whatever cause,       620
Seem most at variance with all moral good,
And incompatible with serious thought.
The clown, the child of nature, without guile,
Blest with an infant's ignorance of all




88


THE TASK. IV.


But his own simple pleasures, now and then         625
A wrestling match, a footrace, or a fair,
Is balloted, and trembles at the news:
Sheepish he doffs his hat, and mumbling swears
A Bible-oath to be whate'er they please,
To do he knows not what. The task performed,        630
That instant he becomes the serjeant's care,
His pupil, and his torment, and his jest.
His awkward gait, his introverted toes,
Bent knees, round shoulders, and dejected looks,
Procure him many a curse. By slow degrees,          635
Unapt to learn, and formed of stubborn stuff,
He yet by slow degrees puts off himself,
Grows conscious of a change, and likes it well:
He stands erect; his slouch becomes a walk;
He steps right onward, martial in his air,          640
His form, and movement; is as smart above
As meal and larded locks can make him; wears
His hat, or his plumed helmet, with a grace;
And his three years of heroship expired,
Returns indignant to the slighted plough.           645
He hates the field in which no fife or drum
Attends him, drives his cattle to a march,
And sighs for the smart comrades he has left.
'Twere well if his exterior change were all,
Btft with his clumsy port the wretch has lost       650
His ignorance and harmless manners too.
To swear, to game, to drink; to show at home
By lewdness, idleness, and sabbath-breach,
The great proficiency he made abroad;
To astonish and to grieve his gazing friends;       655
To break some maiden's and his mother's heart;
To be a pest where he was useful once;
Are his sole aim, and all his glory now.
Man in society is like a flower
Blown in its native bed; 'tis there alone           660
His faculties, expanded infutEioom,
Shine out; there only reach their proper use.)




THE WINTER EVENING.                 89
But man associated and leagued with man
By regal warrant, or self-joined by bond
For interest sake, or swarming into clans         665
Beneath one head for purposes of war,
Like flowers selected from the rest, and bound
And bundled close to fill some crowded vase,
Fades rapidly, and by compression marred,
Contracts defilement not to be endured.           670
Hence chartered boroughs are such public plagues;
And burghers, men immaculate perhaps
In all their private functions, once combined,
Become a loathsome body, only fit
For dissolution, hurtful to the main.             675
Hence merchants, unimpeachable of sin
Against the charities of domestic life,
Incorporated, seem at once to lose
Their nature, and disclaiming all regard
For mercy and the common rights of man,           680
Build factories with blood, conducting trade
At the sword's point, and dyeing the white robe
Of innocent commercial Justice red.
Hence, too, the field of glory, as the world
Misdeems it, dazzled by its bright array,         685
With all its majesty of thundering pomp,
Enchanting music, and immortal wreaths,
Is but a school where thoughtlessness is taught
On principle, where foppery atones
For folly, gallantry for every vice.              690
But slighted as it is, and by the great
Abandoned, and which still I more regret,
Infected with the manners and the modes
It knew not once, the country wins me still.
I never framed a wish, or formed a plan,          695
That flattered me with hopes of earthly bliss,
But there I laid the scene. There early strayed
My Fancy, ere yet liberty of choice
Had found me, or the hope of being free.
My very dreams were rural; rural too              700




go


THE TASK. IV.


The firstborn efforts of my youthfl. Muse,
Sportive, and jingling her poetic bells,
Ere yet her ear was mistress of their powers.
No bard could please me but whose lyre was tuned
To Nature's praises. Heroes and their feats       705
Fatigued me, never weary of the pipe
Of Tityrus, assembling, as he sang,
The rustic throng beneath his favourite beech.
Then MILTON had indeed a poet's charms:
New to my taste his Paradise surpassed            710
The struggling efforts of my boyish tongue
To speak its excellence; I danced for joy;
I marvelled much that, at so ripe an age
As twice seven years, his beauties had then first
Engaged my wonder, and admiring still,            715
And still admiring, with regret supposed
The joy half lost, because not sooner found.
Thee too enamoured of the life I loved,
Pathetic in its praise, in its pursuit
Determined, and possessing it at last             720
With transports such as favoured lovers feel,
I studied, prized, and wished that I had known,
Ingenious COWLEY! and though now reclaimed
By modern lights from an erroneous taste,
I cannot but lament thy splendid wit              725
Entangled in the cobwebs of the schools,
I still revere thee, courtly though retired;
Though stretched at ease in Chertsey's silent bowers,
Not unemployed, and finding rich amends
Eor a lost world in solitude and verse.           730
'Tis born with all: the love of Nature's works
Is an ingredient in the compound, man,
Infused at the creation of the kind.
And though the Almighty Maker has throughout
Discriminated each from each, by strokes          735
And touches of his hand, with so much art
Diversified, that two were never found
Twins at all points-yet this obtains in all,




THE WINTER EVENING.


9I


That all discern a beauty in his works,
And all cai taste them: minds that have been formed 740
And tutored with a relish more exact,
But none without some relish, none unmoved.
It is a flame that dies not even there
Where nothing feeds it. Neither business, crowds,
Nor habits of luxurious city-life,                  745
Whatever else they smother of true worth
In human bosoms, quench it or abate.
The villas with which London stands begirt,
Like a swarth Indian with his belt of beads,
Prove it. A breath of unadulterate air,            750
The glimpse of a green pasture, how they cheer
The citizen, and brace his languid frame!
Even in the stifling bosom of the town,
A garden in which nothing thrives, has charms
That soothe the rich possessor; much consoled      755
That here and there some sprigs of mournful mint,
Of nightshade, or valerian, grace the well
He cultivates. These serve him with a hint
That Nature lives; that sight-refreshing green
Is still the livery she delights to wear,          76o
Though sickly samples of the exuberant whole.
What are the casements lined with creeping herbs,
The prouder sashes fronted with a range
Of orange, myrtle, or the fragrant weed
The Frenchman's darling? Are they not all proofs    765
That man immured in cities, still retains
His inborn inextinguishable thirst
Of rural scenes, compensating his loss
By supplemental shifts, the best he may?
The most unfurnished with the means of life,       770
And they that never pass their brick-wall bounds
To range the fields and treat their lungs with air,
Yet feel the burning instinct: over-head
Suspend their crazy boxes, planted thick,
And watered duly. There the' pitcher stands        775
A fragment, and the spoutless teapot there;




92


THE TA SK. IV.


Sad witnesses how close-pent man regrets
The country, with what ardour he contrives
A peep at Nature, when he can no more.
Hail, therefore, patroness of health and ease   780
And contemplation, heart-consoling joys
And harmless pleasures, in the thronged abode
\Of multitudes unknown! Hail, rural life!
Address himself who will to the pursuit
Of honours, or emolument, or fame,                785
I shall not add myself to such a chase,
Thwart his attempts, or envy his success.
Some must be great. Great offices will have
Great talents: and God gives to every man
The virtue, temper, understanding, taste,         790
That lifts him into life, and lets him fall
Just in the niche he was ordained to fill.
To the deliverer of an injured land
He gives a tongue to enlarge upon, a heart
To feel, and courage to redress her wrongs;       795
To monarchs dignity: to judges sense;
To artists ingenuity and skill;
To me an unambitious mind, content
In the low vale of life, that early felt
A wish for ease and leisure, and ere long         8oo
Found here that leisure and that ease I wished.




BOOK V.
THE WINTER MORNING WALK.
ARGUMENT:-A frosty morning, I-The foddering of cattle, 27 -The woodman and his dog, 4 —The poultry, 57-Whimsical effects of
frost at a waterfall, 96-The Empress of Russia's palace of ice, I27 -Amusements of monarchs, I77-War, one of them, 185-Wars, whence,
I93-And whence monarchy, 230-The evils of it, 242-English and
French loyalty contrasted, 346-The Bastille, and a prisoner there, 379
-Liberty the chief recommendation of this country, 446-Modern
patriotism questionable, and why, 49I-The perishable nature of the
best human institutions, 509-Spiritual liberty not perishable, 538-The
slavish state of man by nature, 58I-Deliver him, Deist, if you can,
670-Grace must do it, 688-The respective merits of patriots and
martyrs stated, 704-Their different treatment, 707-Happy freedom
of the man whom grace makes free, 733-His relish of the works of
God, 779-Address to the Creator, 84$.
'Tis morning; and the sug, with ruddyorb
Ascending, fires the horizon; while the clouds
That crowd away before the driving wind,
More ardent as the disk emerges more,
Resemble most some city in a blaze,                   5
Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray
Slides ineffectual down the snowy vale,
And, tinging all with his own rosy hue,
From, every herb and every spiry blade
Stretches a length of shadow o'er the field.         Io
Mine, spindling into longitude immense,
In spite of gravity, and sage remark
That I myself am but a fleeting shade,
Provokes me to a smile. With eye askance




94


THE TASK. V.


I view the muscular proportioned limb,       15
Transformed to a lean shank. The shapeless pair,
As they designed to mock me, at my side
Take step for step; and as I near approach
The cottage, walk along the plastered wall,
Preposterous sight! the legs without the man.       20
The verdure of the plain lies buried deep
Beneath the dazzling deluge; and the bents
And coarser grass, upspearing o'er the rest,
Of late unsightly and unseen, now shine
Conspicuous, and in bright apparel clad,           25
And fledged with icy feathers, nod superb.
The cattle mourn in corners where the fence
Screens them, and seem half petrified to sleep
In unrecumbent sadness. There they wait
Their wonted fodder, not like hungering man,       30
Fretful if unsupplied, but silent, meek,
And patient of the slow-paced swain's delay.
He from the stack carves out the accustomed load,
Deep-plunging and again deep-plunging oft,
His broad keen knife into the solid mass:          35
Smooth as a wall the upright remnant stands,
With such undeviating and even force
He severs it away: no needless care,
Lest storms should overset the leaning pile
Deciduous, or its own unbalanced weight.           40
Forth goes the woodman, leaving unconcerned
The cheerful haunts of man, to wield the axe
And drive the wedge in yonder forest drear,
From morn to eve his solitary task.
Shaggy, and lean, and shrewd, with pointed ears     45
And tail cropped short, half lurcher and half cur,
)lis dog attends him. Close behind his heel
lNow creeps he slow; and now, with many a frisk
'Wide scampering, snatches up the drifted snow:With ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout;    50
jThen shakes his powdered coat, and barks for joy.
Heedless of all his pranks, the sturdy churl




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


95


Moves right toward the mark; nor stops for aught.
But, now and then, with pressure of his thumb
To adjust the fragrant charge of a short tube,      55
That fumes beneath his nose: the trailing cloud
Streams far behind him, scenting all the air.
|Now from the roost, or from the neighbouring pale,
IWhere diligent to catch the first faint gleam
Of smiling day, they gossipped side by side,        60
Come trooping at the housewife's well-known call,The feathered tribes domestic. Half on wing
AndTHiaf-bnTot,^tey-brush the fleecy flood,
Conscious, and fearful of too deep a plunge.
The sparrows peep, and quit the sheltering eaves,   65
To seize the fair occasion. Well they eye
The scattered grain, and thievishly resolved
To escape the impending famine, often scared
As oft return, a pert voracious kind.
Clean riddance quickly made, one only care          70
Remains to each, the search of sunny nook,
Or shed impervious to the blast. Resigned
To sad necessity, the cock foregoes
iA wonted strut, and wadingeat their head
With well considered steps, seems to resent         75
His altered gait, and stateliness retrenched.
How find the myriads that in summer cheer
The hills and valleys with their ceaseless songs,
Due sustenance, or where subsist they now?
Earth yields them naught: the imprisoned worm is safe 80
Beneath the frozen clod; all seeds of herbs
Lie covered close; and berry-bearing thorns
That feed the thrush (whatever some suppose)
Afford the smaller minstrels no supply.
The long protracted rigour of the year              85
Thins all their numerous flocks. In chinks and'holes
Ten thousand seek an unmolested end,
As instinct prompts; self-buried ere they die.
The veryrok, and daws forsake the fields,
Where neither grub, nor root, nor earth-nut, now    go




96


THE TASK. PK


Repays their labour more; and perched aloft
By the wayside, or stalking in the path,
Lean pensioners upon the traveller's track,
Pick up their nauseous dole, though sweet to them,
Of voided pulse or half-digested grain.            95
The streams are lost amid the splendid blank,
O'erwhelming all distinction. On the flood,
Indurated and fixed, the snowy weight
Lies undissolved; while silently beneath,
And unperceived, the current steals away.         i0oo
Not so, where, scornful of a check, it leaps
The mill-dam, dashes-on the restless wheel,
And wantons in the pebbly gulf below:
No frost can bind it there; its utmost force
Can but arrest the light and smoky mist           105
That in its fall the liquid sheet throws wide.
And see where it has hung the embroidered banks
With forms so various, that no powers of art,
The pencil, or the pen, may trace the scene!
Here glittering turrets rise, upbearing high      IIo
(Fantastic misarrangement!) on the roof
Large growth of what may seem the sparkling trees
And shrubs of fairy land. The crystal drops
That trickle down the branches, fast congealed,
Shoot into pillars of pellucid length,            I15
And prop the pile they but adorned before.
Hefe grotto within grotto safe defies
The sunbeam; there embossed and fretted wild,
The growing wonder takes a thousand shapes
Capricious, in which Fancy seeks in vain          120
The likeness of some object seen before.
Thus Nature works as if to mock at Art,
And in defiance of her rival powers;
By these fortuitous and random strokes
Performing such inimitable feats,                  25
As she with all her rules can never reach.
Less worthy of applause, though more admired,
Because a novelty, the work of man,




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


97


Imperial mistress of the fur-clad Russ!
Thy most magnificent and mighty freak,             130
The wonder of the North. No forest fell
When thou wouldst build, no quarry sent its stores
To enrich thy walls, but thou didst hew the floods,
And make thy marble of the glassy wave.
In such a palace Aristaeus found                   135
Cyrene, when he bore the plaintive tale
Of his lost bees to her maternal ear.
In such a palace Poetry might place
The armoury of Winter; where his troops,
The gloomy clouds, find weapons, arrowy sleet,      140
Skin-piercing volley, blossom-bruising hail,
And snow that often blinds the traveller's course,
And wraps him in an unexpected tomb.
Silently as a dream the fabric rose;
No sound of hammer or of saw was there.             145
Ice upon ice, the well-adjusted parts
Were soon conjoined; nor other cement asked
Than water interfused to make them one.
Lamps gracefully disposed, and of all hues,
Illumined every side: a watery light                150
Gleamed through the clear transparency, that seemed
Another moon new risen, or meteor fallen
From Heaven to Earth, of lambent flame serene.
So stood the brittle prodigy; though smooth
And slippery the materials, yet frostbound          I55
Firm as a rock. Nor wanted aught within,
That royal residence might well befit,
For grandeur or for use. Long wavy wreaths
Of flowers that feared no enemy but warmth,
Blushed on the panels. Mirror needed none           i6o
Where all was vitreous; but in order due
Convivial table and commodious seat
(What seemed at least commodious seat) were there,
Sofa, and couch, and high built throrfe august.
The same lubricity was found in all,                x65
And all was moist to the warm touch; a scene
VOL. II.                 H




98


THE TASK. V.


Of evanescent glory, once a stream,
And soon to slide into a stream again.,
Alas! 'twas but a mortifying stroke
Of undesigned severity, that glanced              170
(Made by a monarch) on her own estate,
On human grandeur and the courts of kings.
'Twas transient in its nature, as in show
'Twas durable; as worthless as it seemed
Intrinsically precious; to the foot               175
Treacherous and false; it smiled, and it was cold.
Great princes have great playthings. Some have played
At hewing mountains into men, and some
At building human wonders mountain high.
Some have amused the dull sad years of life,      I80
Life spent in indolence, and therefore sad,
With schemes of monumental fame; and sought
By pyramids and mausolean pomp,
Shortlived themselves, to immortalize their bones.
Some seek diversion in the tented field,          I85
And make the sorrows of mankind their sport.
But war's a gamewhich were their subjects wise,
Kings would not play at.) Nations would do well
To extort their truncheons from the puny hands
Of heroes, whose infirm and baby minds            I90
Are gratified with mischief, and who spoil,
Because men suffer it, their toy the World.
When Babel was confounded, and the great
Confederacy of projectors wild and vain
Was split into diversity of tongues,              195
Then, as a shepherd separates his flock,
These to the upland, to the valley those,
God drave asunder, and assigned their lot
To all the nations. Ample was the boon
He gave them, in its distribution fair            200
And equal, and he bade them dwell in peace.
Peace was awhile th&ir care: they ploughed and sowed,
And reaped their plenty without grudge or strife.
But Violence can never longer sleep




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.                99
Than human passions please. In every heart        205
Are sown the sparks that kindle fiery war;
Occasion needs but fan them, and they blaze.
Cain had already shed a brother's blood;
The Deluge washed it out; but left unquenched
The seeds of murder in the breast of man.         2I0
Soon, by a righteous judgment, in the line
Of his descending progeny vwas found
The first artificer of death; the shrewd
Contriver who first sweated at the forge,
And forced the blunt and yet unbloodied steel     2r5
To a keen edge, and made it bright for war.
Him, Tubal named, the Vulcan of old times,
The sword and falchion their inventor claim,
(And the first smith was the first murderer's sons
His art survived the waters; and ere long,        220
When man was multiplied and spread abroad
In tribes and clans, and had begun to call
These meadows and that range of hills his own,
The tasted sweets of property begat
Desire of more; and industry in some              225
To improve and cultivate their just demesne,
Made others covet what they saw so fair.
Thus war began on earth: these fought for spoil,
And those in self-defence. Savdge at first
The onset, and irregular. At length               230
One eminent above the rest for strength,
For stratagem, or courage, or for all,
Was chosen leader; him they served in war,
And him in peace, for sake of warlike deeds
Reverenced no less. Who could with him compare?   235
Or who so worthy to control themselves,
As he whose prowess had subdued their foes?
Thus war affording field for the display
Of virtue, made one chief, whom times of peace,
Which have their exigencies too, and call         240
For skill in government, at length made king.
King was a name too proud for man to wear
H2




100


THE TASK. V.


With modesty and meekness, and the crown,
So dazzling in their eyes who set it on,
Was sure to intoxicate the brows it bound.        245
It is the abject property of most,
That being parcel of the common mass,
And destitute of means to raise themselves,
They sink and settle lower than they need.
They know not what it is to feel within           250
A comprehensive faculty that grasps
Great purposes with ease, that turns and wields,
Almost without an effort, plans too vast
For their conception, which they cannot move.
Conscious of impotence they soon grow drunk       255
With gazing, when they see an able man
Step forth to notice; and, besotted thus,
Build him a pedestal, and say, 'Stand there,
And be our admiration and our praise.'
They roll themselves before him in the dust,      260
Then most deserving in their own account,
When most extravagant in his applause,
As if exalting him they raised themselves.
Thus by degrees self-cheated of their sound
And sober judgment that he is but man,            265
They demi-deify and fume him so,
That in due season he forgets it too.
Inflated and astrut with self-conceit,
He gulps the windy diet, and ere 'long,
Adopting their mistake, profoundly thinks         270
The world was made in vain, if not for him.
Thenceforth they are his cattle: drudges born
To bear his burdens, drawing in his gears,
And sweating in his service; his caprice
Becomes the soul that animates them all.          275
He deems a thousand or ten thousand lives,
Spent in the purchase of renown for him,
An easy reckoning, and they think the same.
Thus kings were first invented, and thus kings
Were burnished into heroes, and became            280




THE WINTER MORNING WTALK.


iOI


The arbiters of this terraqueous swamp,
Storks among frogs, that have but croaked aknd died.
Strange that such folly as lifts bloated man
To eminence fit only for a God,
Should ever drivel out of human lips,             285
Even in the cradled weakness of the world!
Still stranger much that when at length mankind
Had reached the sinewy firmness of their youth,
And could discriminate and argue well
On subjects more mysterious, they were yet        290
Babes in the cause of freedom, and should fear
And quake before the Gods themselves had made.
But above measure strange, that neither proof
Of sad experience, nor examples set
By some whose patriot virtue has prevailed,       295
Can even now, when they are grown mature
In wisdom, and with philosphic deeps
Familiar, serve to emancipate the rest!       /
Such dupes are men to custom, and so prone
To reverence what is ancient, and can plead       300
A course of long observance for its use,
That even servitude,, the worst of ills,
Because delivered down from sire to son,
Is kept and guarded as a sacred thing.
But is it fit, or can it bear the shock           305
Of rational discussion, that a man,
Compounded and made up like other men
Of elements tumultuous, in whom lust
And folly in as ample measure meet
As in the bosoms of the slaves he rules,          31O
Should be a despot absolute, and boast
Himself the only freeman of his land?
Should, when he pleases, and on whom he will,
Wage war, with any or with no pretence
Of provocation given or wrong sustained,          315
And force the beggarly last doit, by means
That his own humour dictates, from the clutch
Of Poverty, that thus he may procure




I02


THE TA SK. V.


His thousands, weary of penurious life,
A splendid opportunity to die?                    320
Say ye, who (with less prudence than of old
Jotham ascribed to his assembled trees
In politic convention) put your trust
In the shadow of a bramble, and reclined
In fancied peace beneath his dangerous branch,    325
Rejoice in him, and celebrate his sway,
Where find ye passive fortitude? Whence springs
Your self-denying zeal, that holds it good
To stroke the prickly grievance, and to hang
His thorns with streamers of continual praise?    330
We too are friends to loyalty. We love
The king who loves the law, respects his bounds,
And reigns content within them: him we serve
Freely and with delight, who leaves us free:
But recollecting still that he isminan,           335
We trust him not too far. King though he be,
And king in England too, he may be weak
And vain enough to be ambitious still,
May exercise amiss his proper powers,
Or covet more than freemen choose to grant:       340
Beyond that mark is treason. He is ours,
To administer, to guard, to adorn the state,
But not to warp or change it. We are his,
To serve him nobly in the common cause,
True to the death, but not to be his slaves.      345
Mark now the difference, ye that boast your loves
Of kings, between your loyalty and ours.
We love the man; the paltry pageant you:
We the chief patron of the commonwealth;
You the regardless author of its woes:            350
We, for the sake of liberty, a king;
You chains and bondage for a tyrant's sake.
Our love is principle, and has its root
In reason, is judicious, manly, free;
Yours, a blind instinct, crouches to the rod,     355
And licks the foot that treads it in the dust.




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


103


Were kingship as true treasure as it seems,
Sterling, and worthy of a wise man's wish,
I would not be a king to be beloved
Causeless, and daubed with undiscerning praise,   360
Where love is mere attachment to the throne,
Not to the man who fills it as he ought.
Whose freedom is by sufferance, and at will
Of a superior, he is never free.
Who lives, and is not weary of a life             365
Exposed to manacles, deserves them well.
The State that strives for liberty, though foiled, \  S  A
And forced to abandon what she bravely sought, 2  X
Deserves at least applause for her attempt,
And pity for her loss. But that's a cause         370
Not often unsuccessful: power usurped  /
Is weakness when opposed; conscious of wrong,
'Tis pusillanimous and prone to flight.
But slaves that once conceive the glowing thought
Of freedom, in that hope itself possess           375
All that the contest calls for; spirit, strength,
The scorn of danger, and united hearts,
The surest presage of the good they seek.
Then shame to manhood, and opprobrious more
To France than all her losses and defeats,        380
Old or of later date, by sea or land,
Her house of bondage, worse than that of old
Which God avenged on Pharaoh-the Bastille.
Ye horrid towers, the abode of broken hearts,
Ye dungeons and ye cages of despair,              385
That monarchs have supplied, from age to age,
With music such as suits their sovereign ears,
The sighs and groans of miserable men!
There's not an English heart that would not leap  s
To hear that ye were fallen at last; to know      390
That even our enemies, so oft employed
In forging chains for us, themselves were free.
For he that values Liberty confines
His zeal for her predominance within




104


THE TA SK. V.


No narrow bounds; her cause engages him           395
Wherever pleaded. 'Tis the cause of man.
There dwell the most forlorn of human kind,
Immured though unaccused, condemned untried,
Cruelly spared, and hopeless of escape!
There, like the visionary emblem seen             400
By him of Babylon, life stands a stump,
And filleted about with hoops of brass,
Still lives, though all his pleasant boughs are gone.
To count the hour-bell, and expect no change;
And ever, as the sullen sound is heard,           405
Still to reflect, that though a joyless note
To him whose moments all have one dull pace,
Ten thousand rovers in the world at large
Account it music; that it summons some
To theatre, or,jocund feast, or ball;            410
The wearied hireling finds it a release
From labour; and the lover, who has chid
Its long delay, feels every welcome stroke
Upon his heart-strings, trembling with delightTo fly for refuge from distracting thought        415
To such amusements as ingenious woe
Contrives, hard shifting, and without her toolsTo read, engraven on the mouldy walls
In staggering types, his predecessor's tale,
A sad memorial, and subjoin his own-              420
To turn purveyor to an overgorged
And bloated spider, till the pampered pest
Is made familiar, watches his approach,
Comes at his call, and serves him for a friendTo wear out time in numbering to and fro          425
The studs that thick emboss his iron door,
Thenodownward and then upward, then aslant
And then alternate, with a sickly hope
By dint of change to give his tasteless task
Some relish, till the sum, exactly found          430
In all directions, he begins againOh comfortless existence! hemmed around




'HE WINTER MORNING WALK.


I05


With woes, which who that suffers would not kneel
And beg for exile, or the pangs of death?
That man should thus encroach on fellow man,      435
Abridge him of his just and native rights,
Eradicate him, tear him from his hold
Upon the endearments of domestic life
And social, nip his fruitfulness and use,
And doom him for perhaps a heedless word          440
To barrenness, and solitude, and tears,
Moves indignation, makes the name of king,
(Of king whom such prerogative can please)
As dreadful as the Manichean God,
Adored through fear, strong only to destroy.      445
'Tis Liberty alone that gives the flower
Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume,
And we are weeds without it. All constraint,)
Except what wisdom lays on evil men,
Is evil; hurts the faculties, impedes             450
Their progress in the road of science; blinds
The eyesight of Discovery; and begets,
In those that suffer it, a sordid mind
Bestial, a meagre intellect, unfit
To be the tenant of man's noble form.             455
Thee therefore still, blame-worthy as thou art,
With all thy loss of empire, and though squeezed
By public exigence, till annual food
Fails for the craving hunger of the state,
Thee I account still happy, and the chief         460
Among the nations, seeing thou art free,
My native nook of earth! Thy clime is rude,
Replete with vapours, and disposes much
All hearts to sadness, and none more than mine,;
Thine unadulterate manners are less soft          465
And plausible than social life requires,
And thou hast need of discipline and art
To give thee what politer France receives
From Nature's bounty-that humane address
And sweetness, without which no pleasure is       470




Io6


THE TASK. V.


In converse, either starved by cold reserve,
Or flushed with fierce dispute, a senseless brawl;
Yet being free, I love thee: for the sake
Of that one feature can be well content,
Disgraced as thou hast been, poor as thou art,    475
To seek no sublunary rest beside.
But once enslaved, farewell! I could endure
Chains nowhere patiently, and chains at home,
Where I am free by birthright, not at all.
Then what were left of roughness in the grain     480
Of British natures, wanting its excuse
That it belongs to freemen, would disgust
And shock me. I should then with double pain
Feel all the rigour of thy fickle clime;
And if I must bewail the blessing lost,           485
For which our Hampdens and our Sidneys bled,
I would at least bewail it under skies
Milder, among a people less austere,
In scenes which, having never known me free,
Would not reproach me with the loss I felt.       490
Do I forebode impossible events,
And tremble at vain dreams? Heaven grant I may!
But the age of virtuous politics is past,
And we are deep in that of cold pretence.
Patriots are grown too shrewd to be sincere,      495
And we too wise to trust them. He that takes
Deep in his soft credulity the stamp
Designed by loud declaimers on the part
Of Liberty, themselves the slaves of lust,
Incurs derision for his easy faith                500
And lack of knowledge, and with cause enough:
For when was public virtue to be found
Where private was not? Can he love the whole
Who loves no part? He be a nation's friend
Who is, in truth, the friend of no man there?     505
Can he be strenuous in his country's cause,
Who slights the charities for whose dear sake
That country, if at all, must be beloved?




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


107


'Tis therefore sober and good men are sad
For England's glory, seeing it wax pale           5O
And sickly, while her champions wear their hearts
So loose to private duty, that no brain,
Healthful and undisturbed by factious fumes,
Can dream them trusty to the general weal.
Such were not they of old, whose tempered blades  515
Dispersed the shackles of usurped control,
And hewed them link from link. Then Albion's sons
Were sons indeed; they felt a filial heart
Beat high within them at a mother's wrongs,
And shining each in his domestic sphere,          520
Shone brighter still, once called to public view.
'Tis therefore, many whose sequestered lot
Forbids their interference, looking on,
Anticipate perforce some dire event
And seeing the old castle of the state,           525
That promised once more firmness, so assailed
That all its tempest-beaten turrets shake,
Stand motionless expectants of its fall.
All has its date below; the fatal hour
Was registered in Heaven ere time began.          530
We turn to dust, and all our mightiest works
Die too: the deep foundations that we lay,
Time jloughs them up, and not a trace remains. / o
We build with what we deem eternal rock;
A distant age asks where the fabric stood,   /    535
And in the dust, sifted and searched in vain,
The undiscoverable secret sleeps.
(But there is yet a Liberty unsung
fBy poets, and by senators unpraised,
Which monarchs cannot grant, nor all the pow-,e   540
Of Earth and Hell confederate take away:
A liberty which persecution, fraud,
Oppression, prisons, have no power to bind,
Which whoso tastes can be enslaved no more.
'Tis Liberty of Heart, derived from Heaven,       545
Bought with His blood who gave it to mankind,




io8


THE TASK. V.


And sealed with the same token. It is held
By charter, and that charter sanctioned sure
By the unimpeachable and awful oath
And promise of a God. )His other gifts               550
All bear the royal stamp that speaks them his,
And are august, but this transcends them all.
His other works, the visible display
Of all-creating energy and might,
Are grand, no doubt, and worthy of the Word          555
That finding an interminable space
Unoccupied, has filled the void so well,
And made so sparkling what was dark before.
But these are not his glory. Man, 'tis true,
Smit with the beauty of so fair a scene,             560
Might well suppose the artificer divine
Meant it eternal, had he not himself
Pronounced it transient, glorious as it is,
And still designing a more glorious far,
Doomed it, as insufficient for his praise.           565
These, therefore, are occasional, and pass;
Formed for the confutation of the fool
Whose lying heart disputes against a God;
That office served, they must be swept away.
Not so the labours of his love: they shine           570
In other heavens than these that we behold,
And fade not. There is Paradise that fears
No forfeiture, and of its fruits he sends
Large prelibation oft to saints below.
Of these the first in order, and the pledge          575
And confident assurance of the rest,
Is Liberty: a flight into his arms,
Ere yet mortality's fine threads give way;
A clear escape from tyrannizing lust,
And full immunity from penal woe.                    580
(  hgains are the portion of revolted man,
Stripes, and a dungeon; and his body serves
The triple purpose. In that sickly, foul,
Opprobrious residence, he finds them all,




THE WINTER MORNING        WALK.         l09
Propense his heart to idols, he is held            585
In silly dotage on created things,
Careless of their Creator. And that low
And sordid gravitation of his powers
To a vile clod, so draws him, with such force
Resistless from the centre he should seek,         590
That he at last forgets it. All his hopes
Tend downward; his ambition is to sink,
To reach a depth profounder still, and still
Profounder, in the fathomless abyss
Of folly, plunging in pursuit of death.            595
But ere he gain the comfortless repose
He seeks, an acquiescence of his soul
In heaven-renouncing exile, he enduresWhat does he not, from lusts opposed in vain,
And self-reproaching conscience? He foresees       6oo
The fatal issue to his health, fame, peace,
Fortune, and dignity; the loss of all
That can ennoble man, and make frail life,
Short as it is, supportable. Still worse,
Far worse than all the plagues with which his sins  605
Infect his happiest moments, he forebodes
Ages of hopeless misery. Future death,
And death still future. Not a hasty stroke,
Like that which sends him to the dusty grave,
But unrepealable enduring death.                   6ro
Scripture is still a trumpet to his fears:
What none can prove a forgery, may be true;
What none but bad men wish exploded, must.
That scruple checks him. Riot is not loud
Nor drunk enough to drown it. In the midst,        6r5
Of laughter his compunctions are sincere,
And he abhors the jest by which he shines.
Remorse begets reform. His master-lust
Falls first before his resolute rebuke,
And seems dethroned and vanquished. Peace ensues, 620
But spurious and short-lived; the puny child
Of self-congratulating Pride, begot




l lo


THE TASK. V.


On fancied Innocence. Again he falls,
And fights again; but finds his best essay
A presage ominous, portending still               625
Its own dishonour by a worse relapse.
Till Nature, unavailing Nature, foiled
So oft, and wearied in the vain attempt,
Scoffs at her own performance. Reason now
Takes part with Appetite, and pleads the cause    630
Perversely, which of late she so condemned;
With shallow shifts and old devices, worn
And tattered in the service of debauch,
Covering his shame from his offended sight.
'/,Hath God indeed given appetites to man,        635
/'And stored the earth so plenteously with means; 'To gratify the hunger of his wish,
'And doth he reprobate and will he damn
'The use of his own bounty?-making first
'So frail a kind, and then enacting laws          640
'So strict, that less than perfect must despair?
'Falsehood! which whoso but suspects of truth
'Dishonours God, and makes a slave of man.
'Do they themselves, who undertake for hire
'The teacher's office, and dispense at large      645
'Their weekly dole of edifying strains,
'Attend to their own music? Have they faith
'In what, with such solemnity of tone
'And gesture, they propound to our belief?
Nay-conduct hath the loudest tongue. The voice   650
'Is but an instrument on which the priest
'May play what tune he pleases. In the deed,
'The unequivocal, authentic deed,
'We find sound argument, we read the heart.'
Such reasonings (if that name must needs belong  655
To excuses in which reason has no part)
Serve to compose a spirit well inclined
To live on terms of amity with vice,
And sin without disturbance. Often urged,
(As often as libidinous discourse                 66o




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


I II


Exhausted, he resorts to solemn themes
Of theological and grave import)
They gain at last his unreserved assent;
Till hardened his heart's temper in the forge
Of lust, and on the anvil of despair,             665
He slights the strokes of conscience. Nothing moves,
Or nothing much, his constancy in ill,
Vain tampering has but fostered his disease,
'Tis desperate, and he sleeps the sleep of death.
Haste now, philosopher, and set him free.         670
Charm the deaf serpent wisely. Make him hear
Of rectitude and fitness, moral truth
How lovely, and the moral sense how sure,
Consulted and obeyed, to guide his steps
Directly to the FIRST AND ONLY FAIR.              675
Spare not in such a cause. Spend all the powers
Of rant and rhapsody in virtue's praise:
Be most sublimely good, verbosely grand,
And with poetic trappings grace thy prose,
Till it out-mantle all the pride of verse.-       68o
Ah, tinkling cymbal and high-sounding brass,
Smitten in vain! such music cannot charm
The eclipse that intercepts truth's heavenly beam,
And chills and darkens a wide-wandering soul.
The still small voice is wanted. He must speak,   685
Whose word leaps forth at once to its effect,
Who calls for things that are not, and they come.
Grace makes the slave a freeman. 'Tis a change
That turns to ridicule the turgid speech
And stately tone of moralists, who boast,         690
As if, like him of fabulous renown,
They had indeed ability to smooth
The shag of savage nature, and were each
An Orpheus, and omnipotent in song.
But transformation of apostate man                695
From fool to wise, from earthly to divine,
Is work for him that made him. He alone,
And He by means in philosophic eyes




112


THE TASK. V.


Trivial and worthy of disdain, achieves
The wonder; humanizing what is brute              700
In the lost kind, extracting from the lips
Of asps their venom, overpowering strength
By weakness, and hostility by love.
Patriots have toiled, and in their country's cause
Bled nobly, and their deeds, as they deserve,     705
Receive proud recompense. We give in charge
Their names to the sweet lyre. The Historic Muse,
Proud of the treasure, marches with it down
To latest times; and Sculpture, in her turn,
Gives bond in stone and ever-during brass         710
To guard them, and to immortalize her trust. )
But fairer wreaths are due, though never paid,
To those who, posted at the shrine of Truth,
Have fallen in her defence. A Patriot's blood,
Well spent in such a strife, may earn indeed,     715
And for a time ensure, to his loved land
The sweets of Liberty and equal laws;
But Martyrs struggle for a brighter prize,
And win it with more pain. Their blood is shed
In confirmation of the noblest claim,             720
Our claim to feed upon immortal truth,
To walk with God, to be divinely free,
To soar, and to anticipate the skies.
Yet few remember them. They lived unknown
Till Persecution dragged them into fame,          725
And chased them up to Heaven. Their ashes flewNo marble tells us whither. With their names
No bard embalms and sanctifies his song;
And History, so warm on meaner themes,
Is cold on this. She execrates indeed             730
The tyranny that doomed them to the fire,
But gives the glorious sufferers little praise.
L He is the freeman whom the Truth makes free,
And all are slaves beside.) There's not a chain
That hellish foes, confederate for his harm,      735
Can wind around him, but he casts it off




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


II3


With as much ease as Samson his green withes.
He looks abroad into the varied field
Of Nature, and though poor perhaps compared
With those whose mansions glitter in his sight,   740
Calls the delightful scenery all his own.
His are the mountains, and the valleys his,
And the resplendent rivers. His to enjoy
With a propriety that none can feel,
But who, with filial confidence inspired,         745
Can lift to Heaven an unpresumptuous eye,
And smiling say-'My Father made them all.'
Are they not his by a peculiar right,
And by an emphasis of interest his,
Whose eye they fill with tears of holy joy,       750
Whose heart with praise, and whose exalted mind
With worthy thoughts of that unwearied Love
That planned, and built, and still upholds a world
So clothed with beauty, for rebellious man?
Yes-ye may fill your garners, ye that reap        755
The loaded soil, and ye may waste much good
In senseless riot; but ye will not find
In feast or in the chase, in song or dance,
A liberty like his, who unimpeached
Of usurpation, and to no man's wrong,             760
Appropriates nature as hjs Father's work,
And has a richer use of yours than you.
He is indeed a freeman. Free by birth
Of no mean city, planned or ere the hills
Were built, the fountains opened, or the sea      765
With all his roaring multitude of waves.
His freedom is the same in every state,
And no condition of this changeful life,
So manifold in cares, whose every day
Brings its own evil with it, makes it less;       770
For he has wings that neither sickness, pain,
Nor penury, can cripple or confine.
No nook so narrow but he spreads them there
With ease, and is at large. The oppressor holds
VOL. II.                I




I4


THE TASK. V.


His body bound, but knows not what a range        775
His spirit takes, unconscious of a chain;
And that to bind him is a vain attempt,
Whom God delights in, and in whom He dwells.
Acquaint thyself with God, if thou wouldst taste
His woriks. Admitted once to his embrace,         780
Thoi shalt perceive that thou wast blind before:
Thine eye shall be instructed, and thine heart
Made pure, shall relish with divine delight
'Till then unfelt, what hands divine have wrought.
Brutes graze the mountain-top, with faces prone, '  785
And eyes intent upon the scanty herb
It yields them, or recumbent on its brow,
Ruminate heedless of the scene outspread
Beneath, beyond, and stretching far away
From inland regions to the distant main.          790
Man views it and admires, but rests content
With what he views. The landscape has his praise,
But not its Author. Unconcerned who formed
The Paradise he sees, he finds it such,
And such well pleased to find it, asks no more.   795
Not so the mind that has been touched from Heaven,
And in the school of sacred wisdom taught
To read his wonders, in whose thought the world,
Fair as it is, existed ere it was.
Not for its own sake merely, but for his          800
Much more who fashioned it, he gives it praise;
Praise that from earth resulting, as it ought,
To earth's acknowledged Sovereign, finds at once
Its only just proprietor in him.
The soul that sees him, or receives sublimed      805
cNew   aculties, or learns at least to employ
More worthily the powers she owned before,
Discerns in all things what, with stupid gaze
O  ignorancetilten she overlooked,
A ray ofheavenly light gilding all forms          8o0
Trrestrial, in the vast and the minute
Thifinambiguous footsteps of the God




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


II5


Who gives its lustre to an insect's wing,
And wheels his throne upon the rolling worlds.
Much conversant with Heaven;_sh  often holds      85I
With those fair ministers of light to man,
That fill the skies nightly with silent pomp,
Sweet conference; inquires what strains were they
With which Heaven rang, when every star, in haste
To gratulate the new-created earth,               820
Sent forth a voice, and all the sons of God
Shouted for joy.-' Tell me, ye shining hosts
'That navigate a sea that knows no storms,
' Beneath a vault unsullied with a cloud,
'If from your elevation, whence ye view           825
'Distinctly scenes invisible to man,
'And systems of whose birth no tidings yet
'Have reached this nether world, ye spy a race
'Favoured as ours, transgressors from the womb,
'And hasting to a grave, yet doomed to rise,      830
'And to possess a brighter Heaven than yours?
'As one who long detained on foreign shores
'Pants to return, and when he sees afar
'His country's weather-bleached and battered rocks
'From the green wave emerging, darts an eye       835
'Radiant with joy towards the happy land,
'So I with animated hopes behold,
'And many an aching wish, your beamy fires,
'That show like beacons in the blue abyss,
'Ordained to guide the embodied spirit home       840
'From toilsome life to never ending rest.
'Love kindles as 1 gaze. I feel desires
'That give assurance of their own success,
'And that, infused from Heaven, must thither tend.'
fio reads he Nature, whom the lamp of truth      845
Which whoso sees no longer wanders lost,
With intellects bemazed in endless doubt,
But runs the road of wisdom. Thou hast built
With means that were not till by thee employed,   850
12




i 16


THE TASK. V.


Worlds that had never been hadst Thou in strength
Been less, or less benevolent than strong.
They are thy witnesses, who speak thy power
And goodness infinite, but speak in ears
That hear not, or receive not their report.        855
jin vain thy creatures testify of thee,
Till Thou proclaim thyself.J Theirs is indeed
A teaching voice; but 'tis the praise of thine
That whom it teaches it makes prompt to learn,
-And with the boon gives talents for its use.       86o
DLill Thou art heard, imaginations vain
Possess the heart, and fables false as hell
Yet deemed oracular, lure down to death
Th euninformed and heedless souls of meJ
w_-We give to Chance, blind Chance, ourselves as blind, 865
The glory of thy work, which yet appears
Perfect and unimpeachable of blame,
Challenging human scrutiny, and proved
Then skilful most when most severely judged.
But Chance is not; or is not where Thou reignest:  870
Thy Providence forbids that fickle power
(If power she be that works but to confound)
To mix her wild vagaries with thy laws.
Yet thus we dote, refusing while we can
Instruction, and inventing to ourselves            875
Gods such as guilt makes welcome; gods that sleep,
Or disregard our follies, or that sit
Amused spectators of this bustling stage.
Thee we reject, unable to abide
Thy purity, till pure as Thou art pure,            880
Made such by thee, we love thee for that cause
For which we shunned and hated thee before.
Then we are free. Then Liberty like day
Breaks on the soul, and by a flash from Heaven
Fires all the faculties with glorious joy.         885
A voice is heard that mortal ears hear not
Till Thou hast touched them; 'tis the voice of song,
A loud Hosanna sent from all thy works,




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.                117
Which he that hears it with a shout repeats,
And adds his rapture to the general praise.        890
In that blest moment, Nature throwing wide
Her veil opaque, discloses with a smile
The Author of her beauties who, retired
Behind his own creation, works uiinseen
By the impure, and hears his power denied.         895
Thou art the source and centre of all minds,
Their only point of rest, Eternal Word!
From thee departing, they are lost, and rove
At random, without honour, hope, or peace.
From thee is all that soothes the life of man,     go900
His high endeavour, and his glad success,
His strength to suffer, and his will to server.-s,
But, 0 Thou bounteous giver of all good!
Thou art of all thy gifts thyself the crown;
Give what Thou canst, without thee we are poor,    905
And with thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.




BOOK VI.


THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.
ARGUMENT: —Bells at a distance, I-Their effect, 6-A fine noon in
winter, 57-A sheltered walk, 72-Meditation better than books, 84 -Our familiarity with the course of nature makes it appear less wonderful than it is, II8-The  transformation that spring effects in a
shrubbery described, I4o-A mistake concerning the course of nature
corrected, I98-God naintains it by an unremitted act, 22I-The
amusements fashionable at this hour of the day reproved, 262-Animals
happy, a delightful sight, 32I-Origin of cruelty to animals, 348-That
it is a great crime, proved from Scripture, 459-That proof illustrated
by a tale, 483-A line drawn between the lawful and unlawful destruction of them, 56o-Their good and useful properties insisted on,
601 -Apology for the encomiums bestowed by the author on animals,
621-Instances of man's extravagant praise of man, 632-The groans of
the creation shall have an end, 729-A view taken of the restoration of
all things, 747-An invocation and an invitation of Him who shall bring
it to pass, 818-The retired man vindicated from the charge of uselessness, 906-Conclusion, 995.
THERE is in souls a sympathy with sounds,
And as the mind is pitched the ear is pleased
Witch melting airs or martial, brisk or grave:
r  Some chord in unison with what we hear
S  Is touched within us, and the heart replies.           5
How soft the music of those village bells,
i Falling at intervals upon the ear
/ In cadence sweet, now dying all away,
Now pealing loud again, and louder still,
Clear and sonorous, as the gale comes on!             10
With easy force it opens all the cells
Where Memory slept. Wherever I have heard




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


II9


A kindred melody, the scene recurs,
And with it all its pleasures and its pains.
Such comprehensive views the spirit takes,         15
That in a few short moments I retrace
(As in a map the voyager his course)
The windings of my way through many years.
Short as in retrospect the journey seems,
It seemed not always short; the rugged path,       20
And prospect oft so dreary and forlorn,
Moved many a sigh at its disheartening length.
Yet feeling present eVils, while the past
Faintly impress the mind, or not at all,
How readily we wish time spent revoked,            25
That we might try the ground again, where once
(Through inexperience, as we now perceive,)
We missed that happiness we might have found!
Some friend is gone, perhaps his son's best friend,
A father, whose authority, in show                 30
When most severe, and mustering all its force,
Was but the graver countenance of love;
Whose favour, like the clouds of spring, might lower,
And utter now and then an awful voice,
But had a blessing in its darkest frown,           35
Threatening at once and nourishing the plant.
We loved, but not enough, the gentle hand
That reared us. At a thoughtless age, allured
By every gilded folly, we renounced
His sheltering side, and wilfully forewent         40
That converse which we now in vain regret.
How gladly would the man recall to life
The boy's neglected sire! a mother too,
That softer friend, perhaps more gladly still,
Might he demand them at the gates of death.        45
Sorrow has, since they went, subdued and tamed
The playful humour; he could now endure
(Himself grown sober in the vale of tears)
And feel a parent's presence no restraint.
But not to understand a treasure's worth           50




I120


2THE TA SK.  VI.


Till time has stolen away the slighted good,
Is cause of half the poverty we feel,
And makes the world the wilderness it is.
The few that pray at all pray oft amiss,
And seeking grace to improve the prize they hold,  55
Would urge a wiser suit than asking more.
The night was winter in his roughest mood;
The morning sharp and clear. But now at noon
Upon the southern side of the slant hills,
And where the woods fence off the northern blast   6o
The season smiles, resigning all its rage,
And has the warmth of May. The vault is blue
Without a cloud, and white without a speck
The dazzling splendour of the scene below.
Again the harmony comes o'er the vale,             65
And through the trees I view the embattled tower
Whence all the music. I again perceive
The soothing influence of the wafted strains,
And settled in soft musings as I tread
The walk, still verdant, under oaks and elms,      70
Whose outspread branches overarch the glade.
The roof, though moveable through all its length
As the wind sways it, has yet well sufficed,
And intercepting in their silent fall
The frequent flakes, has kept a path for me.       75
No noise is here, or none that hinders thought.
The redbreast warbles still, but is content
With slender notes, and more than half suppressed:
Pleased with his solitude, and flitting light
From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes   8o
From many a twig the pendent drops of ice,
That tinkle in the withered leaves below.
Stillness, accompanied with sounds so soft,
Charms more than silence. Meditation here
May think down hours to moments. lIj-cthe heart    85
May give a useful lesson to the head,
And Learning wiser grow without his books.
Q1nowledge and Wisdom, far from being one,




THE WINTER IWALK AT NOON.


121


Have ofttimes no connexion.\ Knowledge dwells
In heads replete twith thoughts of other men,       go90
Wisdom in minds attentive to their own.
Knowledge, a rude unprofitable mass,
The mere materials with which Wisdom builds,
Till smoothed and squared and fitted to its place,
Does but encumber whom it seems to enrich.          95
Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much,
Wisdom is humble that he knows no more.
Books are not seldom talismans and spells,
By which the magic art of shrewder wits
L Holds an unthinking multitude enthralled.          100o
Some to the fascination of a name
Surrender judgment hoodwinked. Some the style
Infatuates, and through labyrinths and wilds
Of error, leads them by a tune entranced.
While sloth seduces more, too weak to bear          105
The insupportable fatigue of thought,
And swallowing therefore without pause or choice
The total grist unsifted, husks and all.
But trees, and rivulets whose rapid course
Defies the check of winter, haunts of deer,         no
And sheepwalks populous with bleating lambs,
And lanes in which the primrose ere her time
Peeps through the moss that clothes the hawthorn root,
Deceive no student. Wisdom there, and Truth,
Not shy as in the world, and to be won              115
By slow solicitation, seize at once
The roving thought, and fix it on-themselves.
What prodigies can power divine perform
More grand than it produces year by year,
And all in sight of inattentive man?                120
Familiar with the effect we slight the cause,
And in the constancy of Nature's course,
The regular return of genial months,
And renovation of a faded world,
See naught to wonder at. Should God again,         125
As once in Gibeon, interrupt the race




I22


THE TASK. VI.


Of the undeviating and punctual sun,
How would the world admire! But speaks it less
An agency divine, to make him know
His moment when to sink and when to rise,         130
Age after age, than to arrest his course?
( All we behold is miracle, but seen
A So duly, all is miracle in vain.
I~ Where now the vital energy that moved,
While" summer was, the pure and subtle lymph      135
Through the imperceptible meandering veins
Of ieaf' and flower?  It sleeps; and the icy touch
Of unprolific winter has impressed
A cold stagnation on the intestine tide.
But let the months go round, a few short months,  140
And all shall be restored. These naked shoots,
I     Barren as lances, among which the wind
V\i,!   Makes wintry music, sig ing as it goes,
Shafl put their graceful foliage on again,
And more aspiring, and with ampler spread,        145
Shall boast new charms, and more than they have lost.
Then each in its peculiar honours clad,
Shall publish, even to the distant eye,
Its family and tribe. Laburnum, rich
In streaming gold; Syringa, ivory pure;           J50
The scentless and the scented Rose, this red,
And of an humbler growth, the other tall,
And throwing up into the darkest gloom
Of neighbouring Cypress, or more sable Yew,
Her silver globes, light as the foamy surf,        55? That the wind severs from the broken wave;
The Lilac, various in array, now white,
Now sanguine, and her beauteous head now set
With purple spikes pyramidal, as if
Studious of ornament, yet unresolved              i60
Which hue she most approved, she chose them all;
Copious of flowers the Woodbin, pale and wan,
But well compensating her sickly looks
With never cloying odours, early and late;




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.                123
Hypericum all bloom, so thick a swarm              x65
Of fl6wers, like flies clothing her slender rods,
That scarce a leaf appears; Mezereon too,
Though leafless, well attired, and thick beset
With blushing wreaths, investing every spray;
Althaea with the purple eye; the Broom,             170
Yellow and bright,-as bullion unalloyed,
Her blossoms; and luxuriant above all
The Jasmine, throwing wide her elegant sweets,
The deep dark green of whose unvarnished leaf
Makes more conspicuous, and illumines more          175
The bright profusion of her scattered stars.These have been, and these shall be in their day;
And all this uniform uncoloured scene
Shall be dismantled of its fleecy load,
And flush into variety again.                       I80
",from dearth to plenty, and from death to life,
Is Nature's progress, when she lectures man
In heavenly truth; evincing as she makes
The grand transition, that there lives and works   '.! A soul in all things, and that soul is God.        185? The beauties of the wilderness are his,
That make so gay the solitary place,
Where no eye sees them. And the fairer forms
That cultivation glories in, are his.
He sets the bright procession on its way,           190o
And marshals all the order of the year;
He marks the bounds which Winter may not pass,
And blunts his pointed fury; in its case,
Russet and rude, folds up the tender germ
Uninjured, with inimitable art;              '      I95
And ere one flowery season fades and die]
Designs the blooming wonders of the next.
Some say that in the origin of things,
When all creation started into birth,
t The infant elements received a law                 2oo
t From which they swerve not since. That under force
I Of that controlling ordinance they move,




124


THE TASK. VI.


And need not his immediate hand, who first
Prescribed their course, to regulate it now.
Thus dream they, and contrive to save a God        205
The incumbrance of his own concerns, and spare
The Great Artificer of all that moves
The stress of a continual act, the pain
Of unremitted vigilance and care,
As too laborious and severe a task.                210
So man, the moth, is not afraid, it seems,
To span Omnipotence, and measure might
That knows no measure, by the scanty rule
And standard of his own, that is to-day,
And is not ere to-morrow's sun go down.             215
But how should matter occupy a charge,
Dull as it is, and satisfy a law
So vast in its demands, unless impelled
To ceaseless service by a ceaseless force,
And under pressure of some conscious cause         220
The Lord of all, himself through all diffused,
I  stains and is the life of all that lives.
Nature is but a name for an effect,
i   Whose cause is God. He feeds the secret fire
By which the mighty process is maintained,          225
Who sleeps not, is not weary; in whose sight
Slow-circling ages are as transient days;
Whose work is without labour; whose designs
No flaw deforms, no difficulty thwarts;
And whose beneficence no charge exhausts.           230
Him blind antiquity profaned, not served,
With self-taught rites, and under various names,
Female and male, Pomona, Pales, Pan,
And Flora, and Vertumnus; peopling earth
With tutelary goddesses and gods                    235
That were not; and commending as they would
To each some province, garden, field, or grove.
But all are under One. (One Spirit-His
Who bore the platted thorns       leeding brows,
Rules universal nature. Not a flower               240
' --- —  - -----




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


I25


But shows some touch, in freckle, streak, or stain,
Of his unrivalled pencil. He inspires
Their balmy odours, and imparts their hues,
And bathes their eyes with nectar, and includes
In grains as countless as the seaside sands,      245
The forms with which he sprinkles all the earth.
Happy who walks with him! whom what he finds
Of flavour or of scent in fruit or flower,
Or what he views of beautiful or grand
In nature, from the broad majestic oak            250
To the green blade that twinkles in the sun,
Prompts with remembrance of a present God.
His presence, who made all so fair, perceived,
Makes all still fairer. As with him no scene
Is dreary, so with him all seasons piease.        255
Though winter had been none, had man been true,
And earth be punished for its tenant's sake,
Yet not in vengeance; as this smiling sky,
So soon succeeding such an angry night,
And these dissolving snows, and this clear stream  260
Recovering fast its liquid music, prove.
Who then that has a mind well strung and tuned
To contemplation, and within his reach
A scene so friendly to his favourite task,
Would waste attention at the chequered board,     265
His host of wooden warriors to and fro
Marching and countermarching, with an eye
As fixed as marble, with a forehead ridged
And furrowed into storms, and with a hand
Trembling, as if eternity were hung               270
In balance on his conduct of a pin?
Nor envies he aught more their idle sport,
Who pant with application misapplied
To trivial toys, and pushing ivory balls
Across a velvet level, feel a joy                 275
Akin to rapture, when the bauble finds
Its destined goal of difficult access.
Nor deems he wiser him who gives his noon




126


THE TASK. VI.


To miss, the mercer's plague, from shop to shop
Wandering, and littering with unfolded silks      280
The polished counter, and approving none,
Or promising with smiles to call again.
Nor him who, by his vanity seduced,
And soothed into a dream that he discerns
The difference of a Guido from a daub,            285
Frequents the crowded auction. Stationed there
As duly as the Langford of the show,
With glass at eye, and catalogue in hand,
And tongue accomplished in the fulsome cant
And pedantry that coxcombs learn with ease,       290
Oft as the price-deciding hammer falls,
He notes it in his book, then raps his box,
Swears 'tis a bargain, rails at his hard fate
That he has let it pass-but never bids.
Here unmolested, through whatever sign          295
The sun proceeds, I wander. Neither mist,
Nor freezing sky nor sultry, checking me,
Nor stranger intermeddling with my joy.
Even in the spring and play-time of the year,
That calls the unwonted villager abroad           300
With all her little ones, a sportive train,
To gather king-cups in the yellow mead,
And prink their hair with daisies, or to pick
A cheap but wholesome salad from the brook,
These shades are all my own. The timorous hare,   305
Grown so familiar with her frequent guest,
Scarce shuns me; and the stockdove unalarmed
Sits cooing in the pine-tree, nor suspends
His on love-ditty for my near approach.
Drawn from his refuge in some lonely elm,         3o1
That age or injury has hollowed deep,
Where on his bed of wool and matted leaves
He has outslept the winter, ventures forth
To frisk awhile, and bask in the warm sun,
The s,leir rl, fli  jert  and full of play.  315
He sees me, and at once, swift as a bird,




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


127


Ascends the neighbouring beech; therwhishs    brush,
And perks his ears, and stamps, and scolds aloud,
With all the prettiness of feigned alarm,
And anger insignificantly fierce.                  320
The heart is hard in nature, and unfit
For human fellowship, as being void
Of sympathy, and therefore dead alike
To love and friendship both, that is not pleased
With sight of animals enjoying life,               325
Nor feels their happiness augment his own.
The bounding fawn that darts across the glade
When none pursues, through mere delight of heart,
And spirits buoyant with excess of glee;
The horse, as wanton and almost as fleet,          330
That skims the spacious meadow at full speed,
Then stops and snorts, and throwing high his heels,
Starts to the voluntary race again;
The very kine that gambol at high noon,
The total herd receiving first from one            335
That leads the dance a summons to be gay,
Though wild their strange vagaries, and uncouth
Their efforts, yet resolved with one consent
To give such act and utterance as they may
To ecstasy too big to be suppressed-               340
These, and a thousand images of bliss,
With which kind Nature graces every scene
Where cruel man defeats not her design,
Impart to the benevolent, who wish
All that are capable of pleasure, pleased,          345
A far superior happiness- to theirs,
The comfort of a reasonable joy.
Man scarce had risen, obedient to his call
Who formed him from the dust, his future grave,
When he was crowned as never king was since.       350
God set the diadem upon his head,
And angel choirs attended. Wondering stood
The new-made monarch, while before him passed,
All happy and all perfect in their kind,




i28               THE TASK.     VI.
| The creatures, summoned from their various haunts  355
To see their sovereign, and confess his sway.
Vast was his etmpire, absolute his power,
Or bounded only by a law whose force
k 'Twas his sublimest privilege to feel
And own, the law of universal love.               360
He ruled with meekness, they obeyed with joy;
No cruel purpose lurked within his heart,
And no distrust of his intent in theirs.
So Eden was a scene of harmless sport,
Where kindness on his part who ruled the whole,   365
Begat a tranquil confidence in all,
And fear as yet was not, nor cause for fear.
But sin marred all; and the revolt of man,
That source of evils not exhausted yet,
Was punished with revolt of his from him.         370
Garden of God, how terrible the change
Thy groves and lawns then witnessed! Every heart,
Each animal of every name, conceived
A jealousy and an instinctive fear,
And conscious of some danger, either fled         375
Precipitate the loathed abode of man,
Or growled defiance in such angry sort,
As taught him too to tremble in his turn.
Thus harmony and family accord
Were driven from Paradise; and in that hour        380
The seeds of cruelty, that since have swelled
To such gigantic and enormous growth,
Were sown in human nature's fruitful soil.
Hence date the persecution and the pain
That man inflicts on all inferior kinds,          385
Regardless of their plaints. To make him sport,
To gratify the frenzy of his wrath,
Or his base gluttony, are causes good
And just in his account, why bird and beast
Should suffer torture, and the streams be dyed    390
With blood of their inhabitants impaled.
Earth groans beneath the burden of a war




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


I29


Waged with defenceless innocence, while he,
Not satisfied to prey on all around,
Adds tenfold bitterness to death by pangs          395
Needless, and first torments ere he devours.
Now happiest they that occupy the scenes
The most remote from his abhorred resort,
Whom once, as delegate of God on earth,
They feared, and as his perfect image loved.       400
The wilderness is theirs, with all its caves,
Its hollow glens, its thickets, and its plains
Unvisited by man. There they are free,
And howl and roar as likes them, uncontrolled,
Nor ask his leave to slumber or to play.           405
Woe to the tyrant, if he dare intrude
Within the confines of their wild domain:
The lion tells him-' I am monarch here!'
And if he spare him, spares him on the terms
Of royal mercy, and through generous scorn         410
To rend a victim trembling at his foot.
In measure, as by force of instinct drawn,
Or by necessity constrained, they live
Dependent upon man; those in his fields,
These at his crib, and some beneath his roof.      415
They prove too often at how dear a rate
He sells protection. Witness, at his foot
The spaniel, dying for some venial fault,
Under dissection of the knotted scourge;
Witness the oatintx with stripes and yells         420
Driven to the slaughter, goaded, as he runs,
To madness, while the savage at his heels
Laughs at the frantic sufferer's fury, spent
Upon the guiltless passenger o'erthrown.
He too is witness, noblest of the train            425
That wait on man, the flight-performing horse:
With unsuspecting readiness he takes
His murderer on his back, and pushed all day,
With bleeding sides and flanks that heave for life,
To the far-distant goal, arrives and, dies.        43o
VOL. II.                 K




I30


THE TA SK.  V.


So little mercy shows who needs so much!
Does law, so jealous in the cause of man,
Denounce no doom on the delinquent? None.
He lives, and o'er his brimming beaker boasts
(As if barbarity were high desert)                435
The inglorious feat, and clamorous in praise
Of the poor brute, seems wisely to suppose
The honours of his matchless horse his own.
But many a crime deemed innocent on earth
Is registered in Heaven; and these no doubt       440
Have each their record, with a curse annexed.
Man may dismiss compassion from his heart,
But God will never. When He charged the Jew
To assist his foe's down-fallen beast to rise;
And when the bush-exploring boy that seized       445
The young, to let the parent bird go free;
Proved He not plainly that his meaner works
Are yet his care, and have an interest all,
All, in the universal Father's love?
On Noah, and in him on all mankind,               450
The charter was conferred, by which we hold
The flesh of animals in fee, and claim
O'er all we feed on, power of life and death.
But read the instrument, and mark it well:
The oppression of a tyrannous control             455
Can find no warrant there. Feed then, and yield
Thanks for thy food. Carnivorous through sin,
Feed on the slain, but spare the living brute.
The Governor of all, himself to all
So bountiful, in whose attentive ear              460
The unfledged raven and the lion's whelp
Plead not in vain for pity on the pangs
Of hunger unassuaged, has interposed,
Not seldom, his avenging arm, to smite
The injurious trampler upon Nature's law,         465
That claims forbearance even for a brute.
He hates the hardness of a Balaam's heart;
And prophet as he was, he might not strike




THE WINTER WALK A T NOON.


I13


The blameless animal, without rebuke,
On which he rode. Her opportune offence           470
Saved him, or the unrelenting seer had died.
He sees that human equity is slack
To interfere, though in so just a cause,
And makes the task his own. Inspiring dumb
And helpless victims with a sense so keen         475
Of injury, with such knowledge of their strength,
And such sagacity to take revenge,
That oft the beast has seemed to judge the man.
An ancient, not a legendary tale,
By one of sound intelligence rehearsed            480
(If such who plead for Providence may seem
In modern eyes), shall make the doctrine clear.
Where England, stretched towards the setting sun,
Narrow and long, o'erlooks the western wave,
Dwelt young Misagathus; a scorner he              485
Of God and goodness, atheist in ostent,
Vicious in act, in temper savage-fierce.
He journeyed; and his chance was as he went
To join a traveller, of far different note,
Evander, famed for piety, for years               490
Deserving honour, but for wisdom more.
Fame had not left the venerable man
A stranger to the manners of the youth,
Whose face too was familiar to his view.
Their way was on the margin of the land,          495
O'er the green summit of the rocks, whose base
Beats back the roaring surge, scarce heard so high.
The charity that warmed his heart was moved
At sight of the man-monster. With a smile
Gentle, and affable, and full of grace,           500
As fearful of offending whom he wished
Much to persuade, he plied his ear with truths
Not harshly thundered forth, or rudely pressed,
But like his purpose, gracious, kind, and sweet.
'And dost thou dream,' the impenetrable man       505
Exclaimed, 'that me, the lullabies of age,
K 2




I32


TIHE TASK. FI.


And fantasies of dotards, such as thou,
Can cheat, or move a moment's fear in me?
Mark now the proof I give thee, that the brave
Need no such aids as Superstition lends,            510
To steel their hearts against the dread of Death.'
He spoke, and to the precipice at hand
Pushed with a madman's fury. Fancy shrinks,
And the blood thrills and curdles at the thought
Of such a gulf as he designed his grave.           515
But though the felon on his back could dare
The dreadful leap, more rational his steed
Declined the death, and wheeling swiftly round,
Or ere his hoof had pressed the crumbling verge,
Baffled his rider, saved against his will.          520
The frenzy of the brain may be redressed
/ By medicine well applied, but without grace
The heart's insanity admits no cure.
Enraged the more by what might have reformed
His horrible intent, again he sought                525
Destruction, with a zeal to be destroyed,
With sounding whip, and rowels dyed in blood.
But still in vain. The Providence that meant
A longer date to the far nobler beast,
Spared yet again the ignobler for his sake.         530
And now, his prowess proved, and his sincere
Incurable obduracy evinced,
His rage grew cool; and pleased perhaps to have earned
So cheaply the renown of that attempt,
With looks of some complacence he resumed           535
His road, deriding much the blank amaze
Of good Evander, still where he was left
Fixed motionless, and petrified with dread.
J So on they fared. Discourse on other themes
Ensuing seemed to obliterate the past,              540
And tamer far for so much fury shown,
(As is the course of rash and fiery men)
The rude companion smiled, as if transformed.
But 'twas a transient calm. A storm was near,




THE WINTER WALK A T NOON.              133
An unsuspected storm. His hour was come.          545
The impious challenger of power divine
Was now to learn that Heaven, though slow to wrath,
Is never with impunity defied.
His horse, as he had caught his master's mood,
Snorting, and starting into sudden rage,          550
Unbidden, and not now to be controlled,
Rushed to the cliff, and having reached it, stood.
At once the shock unseated him: he flew
Sheer o'er the craggy barrier, and immersed
Deep in the flood, found, when he sought it not,  555
The death he had deserved, and died alone.
So God wrought double justice; made the fool
The victim of his own tremendous choice,
Ajd taught a brute the way to safe revenge.
I would not enter on my list of friends         560
(Though graced with polished manners and fine sense,
Yet wanting sensibility) the man
o needlessly sets foot upon a worm.
An inadvertent step may crush the snail
That crawls at evening in the public path;        565
But he that has humanity, forewarned,
Will tread aside, and let the reptile live.
The creeping vermin, loathsome to the sight,
And charged perhaps with venom, that intrudes,
A visitor unwelcome, into scenes                  570
Sacred to neatness and repose, the alcove,
The chamber, or refectory, may die:
A necessary act incurs no blame.
Not so, when, held within their proper bounds
And guiltless of offence, they range the air,     575
Or take their pastime in the spacious field:
There they are privileged; and he that hunts
Or harms them there, is guilty of a wrong,
Disturbs the economy of Nature's realm,
Who, when she formed, designed them an abode.     580
The sum is this. If man's convenience, health,
Or safety interfere, his rights and claims




134


THE TA SK. VI.


Are paramount, and must extinguish theirs.
Else they are all-the meanest things that are,
As free to live, and to enjoy that life,          585
As God was free to form them at the first,
Who in his sovereign wisdom made them all.
Ye, therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons
To love it too. The spring-time of our years
Is soon dishonoured and defiled in most           590
By budding ills, that ask a prudent hand
To check them. But, alas! none sooner shoots,
If unrestrained, into luxuriant growth,
Than cruelty, most devilish of them all.
Mlercy to him that shows it, is the rule          595
And righteous limitation of its act,
By which Heaven moves in pardoning guilty man;
And he that shows none, being ripe in years,
And conscious of the outrage he commits,
Shall seek it, and not find it, in his turn.      6oo
Distinguished much by reason, and still more
By our capacity of grace divine,
From creatures that exist but for our sake,
Which having served us, perish, we are held
Accountable, and God, some future day,            6o0
Will reckon with us roundly for the abuse
Of what he deems no mean or trivial trust.
Superior as we are, they yet depend
Not more on human help, than we on theirs.
Their strength, or speed, or vigilance, were given  6io
In aid of our defects. In some are found
Such teachable and apprehensive parts,
That man's attainments in his own concerns,
Matched with the expertness of the brutes in theirs,
Are oft-times vanquished and thrown far behind.   6I5
Some show that nice sagacity of smell,
And read with such discernment, in the port
And figure of the man, his secret aim,
That oft we owe our safety to a skill
We could not teach, and must despair to learn.    620




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.               I35
But learn we might, if not too proud to stoop
To quadruped instructors, many a good
And useful quality, and virtue too,
Rarely exemplified among ourselves.
Attachment never to be weaned or changed          625
By any change of fortune; proof alike
Against unkindness, absence, and neglect;
Fidelity that neither bribe nor threat
Can move or warp; and gratitude for small
And trivial favours, lasting as the life,         630
And glistening even in the dying eye. /
Man praises man. Desert in arts or arms
Wins public honour; and ten thousand sit
Patiently present at a sacred song,
Commemoration-mad; content to hear                635
(O wonderful effect of music's power!)
Messiah's eulogy, for Handel's sake.
But less, methinks, than sacrilege might serve(For was it less? What heathen would have dared
To strip Jove's statue of his oaken wreath,       640
And hang it up in honour of a man?)
Much less might serve, when all that we design
Is but to gratify an itching ear,
And give the day to a musician's praise.
Remember Handel! Who that was not born            645
Deaf as the dead to harmony, forgets,
Or can, the more than Homer of his age?
Yes-we remember him; and while we praise
A talent so divine, remember too
That his most holy book, from whom it came,       650
Was never meant, was never used before,
To buckram out the memory of a man.
But hush!-the Muse perhaps is too severe,
And with a gravity beyond the size
And measure of the offence, rebukes a deed        655
Less impious than absurd, and owing more
To want of judgment than to wrong design.
So in the chapel of old Ely House,




136               THE TASK.     VI.
When wandering Charles, who meant to be the third,
Had fled from William, and the news was fresh,    660
The simple clerk, but loyal, did announce
And eke did rear right merrily, two staves,
Sung to the praise and glory of king George!
Man praises man; and Garrick's memory next,
When time hath somewhat mellowed it, and made     665
The idol of our worship while he lived
The god of our idolatry once more,
Shall have its altar; and the world shall go
In pilgrimage to bow before his shrine.
The theatre, too small, shall suffocate           670
Its squeezed contents, and more than it admits
Shall sigh at their exclusion, and return
Ungratified. For there some noble lord
Shall stuff his shoulders with king Richard's bunch,
Or wrap himself in Hamlet's inky cloak,           675
And strut, and storm, and straddle, stamp, and stare,
To show the world how Garrick did not act.
For Garrick was a worshipper himself;
He drew the liturgy, and framed the rites
And solemn ceremonial of the day,                 680
And called the world to worship on the banks
Of Avon, famed in song. Ah, pleasant proof
That piety has still in human hearts
Some place, a spark or two not yet extinct!
The mulberry-tree was hung with blooming wreaths;  685
The mulberry-tree stood centre of the dance;
The mulberry-tree was hymned with dulcet airs;
And from his touchwood trunk the mulberry-tree
Supplied such relics as devotion holds
Still sacred, and preserves with pious care.      690
So 'twas a hallowed time: decorum reigned,
nd mirth without offence. No few returned,
oubtless, much edified, and all refreshed.
Man praises man. The rabble all alive,
From tippling benches, cellars, stalls, and styes,  695
Swarm in the streets. The statesman of the day,




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


I37


A pompous and slow-moving pageant, comes.
Some shout him, and some hang upon his car,
To gaze in his eyes, and bless him. Maidens wave
Their kerchiefs, and old women weep for joy;      700
While others, not so satisfied, unhorse
The gilded equipage, and turning loose
His steeds, usurp a place they well deserve.
Why? What has charmed them? Hath he saved the state?
No. Doth he purpose its salvation? No.            705
Enchanting novelty, that moon at full
That finds out every crevice of the head
That is not sound and perfect, hath in theirs
Wrought this disturbance. But the wane is near,
And his own cattle must suffice him soon.         710
Thus idly do we waste the breath of praise,
And dedicate a tribute, in its use
And just direction sacred, to a thing
Doomed to the dust, or lodged already there.
Encomium in old time was poet's work;             715
But poets having lavishly long since
Exhausted all materials of the art,
The task now falls into the public hand;
And I, contented with an humble theme,
Have poured my stream of panegyric down           720
The-vale of Nature, where it creeps and winds
Among her lovely works, with a secure
And unambitious course, reflecting clear,
If not the virtues, yet the worth of brutes.
And I am recompensed, and deem the toils          725
Of poetry not lost, if verse ofiene
May stand between an animal and woe,
And teach one tyrant pity for his drudge.
The groans of Nature in this nether world,
Which Heaven has heard for ages, have an end.     730
Foretold by prophets, and by poets sung,
Whose fire was kindled at the prophets' lamp,
The time of rest, the promised Sabbath, comes.
Six thousand years of sorrow have well nigh




138


THE TASK. VI.


Fulfilled their tardy and disastrous course        735
Over a sinful world; and what remains
Of this tempestuous state of human things,
Is merely as the working of a sea
Before a calm, that rocks itself to rest:
For He, whose car the winds are, and the clouds    740
The dust that waits upon his sultry march,
When sin hath moved him, and his wrath is hot,
Shall visit earth in mercy; shall descend
Propitious in his chariot paved with love;
And what his storms have blasted and defaced       745
For man's revolt, shall with a smile repair.
Sweet is the harp of prophecy; too sweet
Not to be wronged by a mere mortal touch:
Nor can the wonders it records be sung
To meaner music, and not stiffer loss.             750
But when a poet, or when one like me,
Happy to rove among poetic flowers
Though poor in skill to rear them, lights at last
On some fair theme, some theme divinely fair,
Such is the impulse and the spur he feels          755
To give it praise proportioned to its worth,
That not to attempt it, arduous as he deems
The labour, were a task more arduous still.
o scenes surpassing fable, and yet true,
Scenes of accomplished bliss! which who can see,   760
Though but in distant prospect, and not feel
His soul refreshed with foretaste of the joy?
Rivers of gladness water all the earth,
And clothe all climes with beauty. The reproach
Of barrenness is passed. The fruitful field        765
Laughs with abundance, and the land, once lean,
Or fertile only in its own disgrace,
Exults to see its thistly curse repealed.
The various seasons woven into one,
And that one season an eternal spring,             719
The garden fears no blight, and needs no fence,
For there is none to covet, all are full.




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


I39


The lion, and the libbard, and the bear
Graze with the fearless flocks; all bask at noon
Together, or all gambol in the shade               775
Of the same grove, and drink one common stream.
Antipathies are none. No foe to man
Lurks in the serpent now: the mother sees,
And smiles to see, her infant's playful hand
Stretched forth to daily with the crested worm,    780
To stroke his azure neck, or to receive
The lambent homage of his arrowy tongue.
All creatures worship man, and all mankind,
One Lord, one Father. Error has no place;
That creeping pestilence is driven away;           785
The breath of Heaven has chased it. In the heart
No passion touches a discordant string,
But all is harmony and love. Disease
Is not. The pure and uncontaminate blood
Holds its due course, nor fears the frost of age.  790
One song employs all nations, and all cry,
' Worthy the Lamb, for he was slain for us!'
The dwellers in the vales and on the rocks
Shout to each other, and the mountain tops
From distant mountains catch the flying joy,       795
Till nation after nation taught the strain,
Earth rolls the rapturous Hosanna round.
Behold the measure of the promise filled;
See Salem built, the labour of a God!
Bright as a sun the sacred city shines;            800
All kingdoms and all princes of the earth
Flock to that light; the glory of all lands
Flows into her; unbounded is her joy,
And endless her increase. Thy rams are there,
Nebaioth, and the flocks of Kedar there;           805
The looms of Ormus, and the mines of Ind,
And Saba's spicy groves pay tribute there.
Praise is in all her gates: upon her walls,
And in her streets, and in her spacious courts,
Is heard salvation. Eastern Java there             8I0




140


THE TASK. VI.


Kneels with the native of the farthest west;
And /Ethiopia spreads abroad the hand,
And worships. Her report has travelled forth
Into all lands. From every clime they come
To see thy beauty, and to share thy joy,            815
O Sion! an assembly such as earth
Saw never, such as Heaven stoops down to see.
Thus Heavenward all things tend. For all were once
Perfect, and all must be at length restored.
So God has greatly purposed; who would else         820
In his dishonoured works himself endure
Dishonour, and be wronged without redress.
Haste, then, and wheel away a shattered world,
Ye slow-revolving seasons! We would see
(A sight to which our eyes are strangers yet)       825
A world that does not dread and hate his laws,
And suffer for its crime; would learn how fair
The creature is that God pronounces good,
How pleasant in itself what pleases him.
Here every drop of honey hides a sting,             830
Worms wind themselves into our sweetest flowers,
And even the joy that haply some poor heart
Derives from Heaven, pure as the fountain is,
Is sullied in the stream, taking a taint
From touch of human lips, at best impure.           835
Oh for a world in principle as chaste
As this is gross and selfish! over which
Custom and Prejudice shall bear no sway,
That govern all things here, shouldering aside
The meek and modest Truth, and forcing her          840
To seek a refuge from the tongue of Strife
In nooks obscure, far from the ways of men:
Where Violence shall never lift the sword,
Nor Cunning justify the proud man's wrong,
Leaving the poor no remedy but tears:               845
Where he that fills an office, shall esteem
The occasion it presents of doing good
More than the perquisite: where Law shall speak




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


141


Seldom, and never but as Wisdom prompts
And Equity; not jealous more to guard             850
A worthless form, than to decide aright:
Where Fashion shall not sanctify abuse,
Nor smooth Good-breeding (supplemental grace)
With lean performance ape the work of Love.
Come then, and added to thy many crowns,        855
Receive yet one, the crown of all the Earth,
Thou who alone art worthy! It was thine
By ancient covenant ere Nature's birth,
And thou hast made it thine by purchase since,
And overpaid its value with thy blood.            86o
Thy saints proclaim thee king; and in their hearts
Thy title is engraven with a pen
Dipped in the fountain of eternal love.
Thy saints proclaim thee king; and thy delay
Gives courage to their foes, who, could they see  865
The dawn of thy last advent, long-desired,
Would creep into the bowels of the hills,
And flee for safety to the falling rocks.
The very spirit of the world is tired
Of its own taunting question, asked so long,      870
'Where is the promise of your Lord's approach?'
The infidel has shot his bolts away,
Till his exhausted quiver yielding none,
He gleans the blunted shafts that have recoiled,
And aims them at the shield of Truth again.       875
The veil is rent, rent too by priestly hands,
That hides divinity from mortal eyes;
And all the mysteries to faith proposed,
Insulted and traduced, are cast aside
As useless, to the moles and to the bats.         88o
They now are deemed the faithful, and are praised,
Who, constant only in rejecting thee,
Deny thy Godhead with a martyr's zeal,
And quit their office for their error's sake.
Blind and in love with darkness! yet even these   885
Worthy, compared with sycophants, who knee




142


THE TASK. VI.


Thy name, adoring, and then preach thee man.
So fares thy church. But how thy church may fare
The world takes little thought. Who will may preach,
And what they will. All pastors are alike         890
To wandering sheep, resolved to follow none.
Two gods divide them all-Pleasure and Gain. /
For these they live, they sacrifice to these,
And in their service wage perpetual war
With Conscience and with thee. Lust in their hearts, 895
And mischief in their hands, they roam the earth
To prey upon each other: stubborn, fierce,
High-minded, foaming out their own disgrace.
Thy prophets speak of such; and, noting down
The features of the last degenerate times,        900
Exhibit every lineament of these.
Come then, and added to thy many crowns,
Receive yet one, as radiant as the rest,
Due to thy last and most effectual work,
Thy word fulfilled, the conquest of a world!      905
He is the happy man, whose life even now
Shows somewhat of that happier life to come;
Who doomed to an obscure but tranquil state,
Is pleased with it, and were he free to choose,
Would make his fate his choice; whom Peace, the fruit  90o
Of virtue, and whom Virtue, fruit of faith,
Prepare for happiness; bespeak him one
Content indeed to sojourn while he must
Below the skies, but having there his home.
The World o'erlooks him in her busy search        915
Of objects more illustrious in her view;
And occupied as earnestly as she,
Though more sublimely, he o'erlooks the World.
She scorns his pleasures, for she knows them not;
He seeks not hers, for he has proved them vain.   920
He cannot skimn the ground like summer birds
Pursuing gilded flies, and such he deems
Her honours, her emoluments, her joys.
Therefore in Contemplation is his bliss,




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON..43


Whose power is such, that whom she lifts from earth 925
She makes familiar with a Heaven unseen,
And shows him glories yet to be revealed.  /
Not slothful he, though seeming unemployed,
And censured oft as useless. Stillest streams
Oft water fairest meadows, and the bird           930
That flutters least is longest on the wing.
Ask him, indeed, what trophies he has raised,
Or what achievements of immortal fame
He purposes, and he shall answer-None.
His warfare is within. There unfatigued           935
His fervent spirit labours. There he fights,
And there obtains fresh triumphs o'er himself,
And never-withering wreaths, compared with which
The laurels that a Caesar reaps are weeds.
Perhaps the self-approving haughty World,         940
That as she sweeps him with her whistling silks
Scarce deigns to notice him, or if she see,
Deems him a cipher in the works of God,
Receives advantage from his noiseless hours,
Of which she little dreams. Perhaps she owes      945
Her sunshine and her rain, her blooming spring
And plenteous harvest, to the prayer he makes,
When, Isaac like, the solitary saint
Walks forth to meditate at eventide,
And think on her, who thinks not for herself.     950
Forgive him, then, thou bustler in concerns
Of little worth, an idler in the best,
If author of no mischief and some good,
He seek his proper happiness by means
That may advance, but cannot hinder, thine.       955
Nor though he tread the secret path of life,
Engage no notice, and enjoy much ease,
Account him an encumbrance on the state,
Receiving benefits, and rendering none.
His sphere though humble, if that humble sphere   960
Shine with his fair example, and though small
His influence, if that influence all be spent




144


THE TA SK. VI.


In soothing sorrow and in quenching strife,
In aiding helpless indigence, in works
From which at least a grateful few derive          965
Some taste of comfort in a world of woe;
Then let the supercilious great confess
He serves his country, recompenses well
The state, beneath the shadow of whose vine
He sits secure, and in the scale of life           970
Holds no ignoble, though a slighted, place.
The man whose virtues are more felt than seen,
Must drop indeed the hope of public praise;
But he may boast what few that win it can,
That if his country stand not by his skill,        975
At least his follies have not wrought her fall.
Polite Refinement offers him in vain
Her golden tube, through which a sensual World
Draws gross impurity, and likes it well,
The neat conveyance hiding all the offence.        980
Not that he peevishly rejects a mode
Because that World adopts it. If it bear
The stamp and clear impression of good sense,
And be not costly more than of true worth,
He puts it on, and for decorum sake,               985
Can wear it even as gracefully as she.
She judges of refinement by the eye,
He by the test of conscience, and a heart
Not soon deceived; aware that what is base
No polish can make sterling, and that Vice,        990
Though well perfumed and elegantly dressed,
Like an unburied carcass tricked with flowers,
Is but a garnished nuisance, fitter far
For cleanly riddance than for fair attire.
So life glides smoothly and by stealth away,       995
More golden than that Age of fabled Gold
Renowned in ancient song; not vexed with care
Or stained with guilt, beneficent, approved
Of God and man, and peaceful in its end.
So glide my life away.l and so at last,           IOOO




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


145


My share of duties decently fulfilled,
May some disease, not tardy to perform
Its destined office, yet with gentle stroke,
Dismiss me weary to a safe retreat,
Beneath the turf that I have often trod.          1005
It shall not grieve me, then, that once, when called
To dress a Sofa with the flowers of verse,
I played awhile, obedient to the fair,
Wi    that light task; but soon, to please her more,
hom flowers alone I knew would little please,   I010
Let fall the unfinished wreath, and roved for fruit;
Roved far, and gathered much: some harsh, 'tis true,
Picked from the thorns and briers of reproof,
But wholesome, well-digested; grateful some
To palates that can taste immortal truth,         1015
Insipid else, and sure to be despised.
But all is in his hand whose praise 'I seek.
In vain the Poet sings, and the World hears,
If He regard not, though divine the theme.
'Tis not in artful measures, in the chime         1020
And idle tinkling of a minstrel's lyre,
To charm his ear, whose eye is on the heart,
Whose frown can disappoint the proudest strain,,,-"'
Whose approbation prosper-even mine.


VOL. II.


L








TIROCINIUM;


OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.
KefpaAaov rI 7ratiEsas opOr? rpo0pr.-PLATO.
ApX7r 7TroXhTElas airaarrs, vewv Tpo(pa.-DIOG. LAERT.
[ARGUMENT:-Man's supremacy derived not from his outward form,
but from the soul, I-Creation in vain, unless subservient to the purposes
of an immortal being, 35-Heavenly truth not difficult to discover,
73-Man made to discover and declare it, Ioo-Duty of making it
known to the young, 103-Importance of infant instruction, IO9 -'Pilgrim's Progress,' I3I-Happy if such studies were approved in riper
years, I47-The Gospel rejected for false philosophy, 185-Corrupting
influence of large schools, 20 —Effects of bad example on the young,
220-College, 240-Errors in education from   following established
precedent, 255-Teachers connive at vice in their pupils, 269 -Degeneracy of schools, 279-Early school associations, 296-Parents
recounting their early follies to their children, 3i8-Advancement in
the world expected from school friendships, 393-These are not always
permanent, 436-Is emulation a right motive of action? 458-Great
and small schools alike, 515-Parental confidence and companionship,
537-This confidence destroyed by absence, 561-Classics not enough,
6o5-Studvqo.f Nature,, 63'-A  private tutor recommended, 658 -Danger of association with servants, 688-Tutors to be treated with
respect, 7o6-Where home example is bad, board in some retired house
recommended, 735-The author's advice not likely to be followed,.779-The middle ranks warned against sending their sons to school,
807-Which should be managed better or encouraged less, 922.]
IT is not from his form, in which we trace
Strength joined with beauty, dignity with grace,
That man, the master of this globe, derives
His right of empire over all that lives.
That form, indeed, the associate of a mind                 5
L2




148


TIROCINI UM;


Vast in its powers, ethereal in its kind,That form, the labour of Almighty skill,
Framed for the service of a free-born will,
Asserts precedence, and bespeaks control,
But borrows all its grandeur from the soul.        Io
Hers is the state, the splendour, and the throne,
An intellectual kingdom, all her own.
For her, the Memory fills her ample page
With truths poured down from every distant age;
For her, amasses an unbounded store,               15
The wisdom of great nations, now no more;
Though laden, not encumbered with her spoil,
Laborious, yet unconscious of her toil,
When copiously supplied, then most enlarged,
Still to be fed, and not to be surcharged.         20
For her the Fancy, roving unconfined,
The present Muse of every pensive mind,
Works magic wonders, adds a brighter hue
To Nature's scenes, than Nature ever knew.
At her command winds rise and waters roar,         25
Again she lays them slumbering on the shore;
With flower and fruit the wilderness supplies,
Or bids the rocks in ruder pomp arise.
For her the Judgment, umpire in the strife
That Grace and Nature have to wage through life,   30
Quick-sighted arbiter of good and ill,
Appointed sage preceptor to the Will,
Condemns, approves, and with a faithful voice
Guides the decision of a doubtful choice.
Why did the fiat of a God give birth             35
To yon fair Sun and his attendant Earth?
And when descending he resigns the skies,
Why takes the gentler Moon her turn to rise,
Whom Ocean feels through all his countless waves,
And owns her power on every shore he laves?        40
Why do the seasons still enrich the year,
Fruitful and young as in their first career?
Spring hangs her infant blossoms on the trees,




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


I49


Rocked in the cradle of the western breeze;
Summer in haste the thriving charge receives,       45
Beneath the shade of her expanded leaves,
Till Autumn's fiercer heats and plenteous dews
'Dye them at last in all their glowing hues.'Twere wild profusion all, and bootless waste,
Power misemployed, munificence misplaced,           50
Had not its author dignified the plan,
And crowned it with the majesty of man.
Thus formed, thus placed, intelligent, and taught,
Look where he will, the wonders God has wrought,
The wildest scorner of his Maker's laws             55
Finds in a sober moment time to pause,
To press the important question on his heart,
'Why formed at all, and wherefore as thou art?
If man be what he seems, this hour a slave,
The next mere dust and ashes in the grave;          60
Endued with reason only to descry
His crimes and follies with an aching eye;
With passions, just that he may prove, with pain,
The force he spends against their fury vain;
And if, soon after having burned, by turns,          65
With every lust with which frail Nature burns,
His being end where death dissolves the bond,
The tomb take all, and all be blank beyond;
Then he, of all that Nature has brought forth,
Stands self-impeached the creature of least worth,   70
And useless while he lives, and when he dies,
Brings into doubt the wisdom of the skies.
Truths that the learned pursue with eager thought
Are not important always as dear-bought,
Proving at last, though told in pompous strains,    75
A childish waste of philosophic pains;
But truths on which depends our main concern,
That 'tis our shame and misery not to learn,
Shine by the side of every path we tread,
With such a lustre he that runs may read.           80
'Tis true that, if to trifle life away




150


TIROCINIUM;


Down to the sunset of their latest day,
Then perish on futurity's wide shore
Like fleeting exhalations, found no more,
Were all that Heaven required of human kind,       85
And all the plan their destiny designed,
What none could reverence all might justly blame,
And man would breathe but for his Maker's shame.
But Reason heard, and Nature well perused,
At once the dreaming mind is disabused.            go
If all we find possessing earth, sea, air,
Reflect his attributes who placed them there,
Fulfil the purpose, and appear designed
Proofs of the wisdom of the all-seeing mind,
'Tis plain the creature whom He chose to invest    95
With kingship and dominion o'er the rest,
Received his nobler nature, and was made
Fit for the power in which he stands arrayed,
That first or last, hereafter if not here,
He too might make his author's wisdom clear,      loo
Praise him on earth, or obstinately dumb,
Suffer his justice in a world to come.
This once believed, 'twere logic misapplied
To prove a consequence by none denied,
That we are bound to cast the minds of youth      105
Betimes into the mould of heavenly truth,
That taught of God they may indeed be wise,
"Nor ignorantly wandering miss the skies.
In early days the Conscience has in most
A quickness, which in later life is lost:          13
Preserved from guilt by salutary fears,,,r, guilty, soon relenting into tears.
Too careless often, as our years proceed,
What friends we sort with, or what books we read,
Our parents yet exert a prudent care               115
To feed our infant minds with proper fare,
And wisely store the nursery by degrees
With wholesome learning, yet acquired with ease.
Neatly secured from being soiled or torn




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


151


Beneath a pane of thin translucent horn,          120
A book (to please us at a tender age
'Tis called a book, though but a single page)
Presents the prayer the Saviour deigned to teach,
Which children use, and parsons-when they preach.
Lisping our syllables, we scramble next           T25
Through moral narrative, or sacred text,
And learn with wonder how this world began,
Who made, who marred, and who has ransomed man;
Points, which, unless the Scripture made them plain,
The wisest heads might agitate in vain.           130
O thou, whom, borne on Fancy's eager wing
Back to the season of life's happy spring,
I pleased remember, and, while memory yet
Holds fast her office here, can ne'er forget;
Ingenious dreamer, in whose well-told tale        I35
Sweet fiction and sweet truth alike prevail;
Whose humorous vein, strong sense, and simple style,
May teach the gayest, make the gravest smile,
Witty, and well-employed, and, like thy Lord,
Speaking in parables his slighted word,           140
I name thee not, lest so despised a name
Should move a sneer at thy deserved fame,
Yet even in transitory life's late day,
That mingles all my brown with sober gray,
Revere the man whose PILGRIM marks the road,      145
And guides the PROGRESS of the soul to God.
'Twere well with most, if books that could engage
Their childhood, pleased them at a riper age;
The man approving what had charmed the boy,
Would die at last in comfort, peace, and joy,     150
And not with curses on his art who stole
The gem of truth from his unguarded soul.
The stamp of artless piety impressed
By kind tuition on his yielding breast,
The youth now bearded, and yet pert and raw,      155
Regards with scorn, though once received with awe,
And warped into the labyrinth of lies,




152


TIROCINIUM,


That babblers, called philosophers, devise,
Blasphemes his creed, as founded on a plan
Replete with dreams, unworthy of a man.           i6o
Touch but his nature in its ailing part,
Assert the native evil of his hearteHis pride resenits the charge, although the proof
Rise in his forehead, and seem rank enough:
Point to the cure, describe a Saviour's cross     i65
As God's expedient to retrieve his loss,
The young apostate sickens at the view,
And hates it with the malice of a Jew.
How weak the barrier of mere Nature proves,
Opposed against the pleasures Nature loves!       I70
While self-betrayed, and wilfully undone,
She longs to yield, no sooner wooed than won.
Try now the merits of this blest exchange
Of modest truth for wit's eccentric range.
Time was, he closed as he began the day,          I75
With decent duty, not ashamed to pray;
The practice was a bond upon his heart,
A pledge he gave for a consistent part;
Nor could he dare presumptuously displease
A power, confessed so lately on his knees.        ISO
But now, farewell all legendary tales,
The shadows fly, philosophy prevails,
Prayer to the winds, and caution to the waves,
Religion makes the free by nature slaves,
Priests have invented, and the world admired,     185
What knavish priests promulgate as inspired,
Till Reason, now no longer overawed,
Resumes her powers, and spurns the clumsy fraud;
And common sense diffusing real day,
The meteor of the Gospel dies away.               Igo
Such rhapsodies our shrewd discerning youth
Learn from expert inquirers after truth;
Whose only care, might truth presume to speak,
Is not to find what they profess to seek.
And thus, well tutored only while we share        195




OR, A REVIEW     OF SCHOOLS.           153
/A mother's lecture and a nurse's care,
' And taught at schools much mythologic stuff,
But sound religion sparingly enough,
Our early notices of truth, disgraced,
X Soon lose their credit, and are all effaced.        200
Would you your son should be a sot or dunce,
Lascivious, headstrong, or all these at once;
That in good time, the stripling's finished taste
For loose expense and fashionable waste,
Should prove your ruin, and his own at last,        205
Train him in public with a mob of boys,
Childish in mischief only and in noise,
Else of a mannish growth, and five in ten
In infidelity and lewdness, men.
There shall he learn, ere sixteen winters old,      210
That authors are most useful, pawned or sold;
That pedantry is all that schools impart,
But taverns teach the knowledge of the heart;
There waiter Dick, with Bacchanalian lays,
Shall win his heart, and have his drunken praise,   215
His counsellor and bosom-friend shall prove,
And some street-pacing harlot his first love.
Schools, unless discipline were doubly strong,
Detain their adolescent charge too long;
The management of tyros of eighteen                 220
Is difficult, their punishment obscene.
The stout tall captain, whose superior size
The minor heroes view with envious eyes,
Becomes their pattern, upon whom they fix
Their whole attention, and ape all his tricks.      225
His pride, that scorns to obey or to submit,
With them is courage; his effrontery wit;
His wild excursions, window-breaking feats,
Robbery of gardens, quarrels in the streets,
His hairbreadth 'scapes, and all his daring schemes  230
Transport them, and are made their favourite themes;
In little bosoms such achievements strike
A kindred spark, they burn to do the like.




1 54


TIROCINIUM';


Thus, half accomplished ere he yet begin
To show the peeping down upon his chin,           235
And as maturity of years comes on,
Made just the adept that you designed your son,
To ensure the perseverance of his course,
And give your monstrous project all its force,
Send him to college. If he there be tamed,        240
Or in one article of vice reclaimed,
Where no regard of ord'nances is shown,
Or looked for now, the fault must be his own.
Some sneaking virtue lurks in him, no doubt,
Where neither strumpets' charms, nor drinking bout, 245
Nor gambling practices, can find it out.
Such youths of spirit, and that spirit too,
'Ye nurseries of our boys, we owe to you:
Though from ourselves the mischief more proceeds,
For public schools 'tis public folly feeds.       250
The slaves of custom and established mode,
With packhorse constancy we keep the road,
Crooked or straight, through quags or thorny dells,
True to the jingling of our leader's bells.
To follow foolish precedents, and wink            255
With both our eyes, is easier than to think,
And such an age as ours balks no expense,
Except of caution and of common sense;
Else, sure, notorious fact and proof so plain
Would turn our steps into a wiser train.          260
I blame not those who, with what care they can,
O'erwatch the numerous and unruly clan,
Or if I blame, 'tis only that they dare
Promise a work of which they must despair.
Have ye, ye sage intendants of the whole,         265
An ubiquarian presence and control,
Elisha's eye, that when Gehazi strayed,
Went with him, and saw all the game he played?
Yes-ye are conscious; and on all the shelves
Your pupils strike upon, have struck yourselves.  270
Or if by nature sober, ye had then,




OR, A REVIEW     OF SCHOOLS.          155
Boys as ye were, the gravity of men,
Ye knew at least, by constant proofs addressed
To ears and eyes, the vices of the rest.
But ye connive at what ye cannot cure,            275
And evils not to be endured, endure,
Lest power exerted, but without success,
Should make the little ye retain still less.
Ye once were justly famed for bringing forth
Undoubted scholarship and genuine worth,          280
And in the firmament of fame still shines
A glory bright as that of all the signs,
Of poets raised by you, and statesmen, and divines.
Peace to them all! those brilliant times are fled,
And no such lights are kindling in their stead.   285
Our striplings shine indeed, but with such rays
As set the midnight riot in a blaze,
And seem, if judged by their expressive looks,
Deeper in none than in their surgeons' books.
Say, Muse, (for education made the song,        290
No Muse can hesitate or linger long)
What causes move us, knowing, as we must,
That these menageries all fail their trust,
To send our sons to scout and scamper there,
While colts and puppies cost us so much care?    295
Be it a weakness, it deserves some praise,
We love the play-place of our early days.
The scene is touching, and the heart is stone
That feels not at that sight, and feels at none.
The wall on which we tried our graving skill,     300
The very name we carved subsisting still,
The bench on which we sat while deep employed,
Though mangled, hacked, and hewed, not yet destroyed;
The little ones, unbuttoned, glowing hot,
Playing our games, and on the very spot,          305
As happy as we once, to kneel and draw
The chalky ring, and knuckle down at taw;
To pitch the ball into the grounded hat,
Or,drive it devious with a dexterous pat;




156


TIROCINIUM;


The pleasing spectacle at once excites              310
Such recollection of our own delights,
That viewing it, we seem almost to obtain
Our innocent sweet simple years again.
This fond attachment to the well-known place,
Whence first we started into life's long race,      315
Maintains its hold with such unfailing sway,
We feel it even in age, and at our latest day.
Hark! how the sire of chits, whose future share
Of classic food begins to be his care,
With his own likeness placed on either knee,       320
Indulges all a father's heart-felt glee,
And tells them, as he strokes their silver locks,
That they must soon learn Latin, and to box;
Then turning, he regales his listening wife
With all the adventures of his early life,          325
His skill in coachmanship, or driving chaise,
In bilking tavern bills, and spouting plays;
What shifts he used, detected in a scrape,
How he was flogged, or had the luck to escape,
What sums he lost at play, and how he sold          330
Watch, seals, and all-till all his pranks are told.
Retracing thus his frolics ('tis a name
That palliates deeds of folly and of shame)
He gives the local bias all its sway,
Resolves that where he played his sons shall play,  335
And destines their bright genius to be shown
Just in the scene where he displayed his own.
The meek and bashful boy will soon be taught
To be as bold and forward as he ought,
The rude will scuffle through with ease enough,     340
/Great schools suit best the sturdy and the rough.
Ah happy designation, prudent choice,
The event is sure, expect it, and rejoice!
\Soon see your wish fulfilled in either child,
The pert made perter, and the tame made wild.       345
The great, indeed, by titles, riches, birth,
Excused the incumbrance of more solid worth,




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


I57


Are best dispcsed of where with most success
They may acquire that confident address,
Those habits of profuse and lewd expense,          350
That scorn of all delights but those of sense,
Which though in plain plebeians we condemn,
With so much reason all expect from them.
But families of less illustrious fame,
Whose chief distinction is their spotless name,    355
Whose heirs, their honours none, their income small,
Must shine by true desert, or not at all,
What dream they of, that, with so little care
They risk their hopes, their dearest treasure, there?
They dream of little Charles or William graced     360
With wig prolix, down-flowing to his waist,
They see the attentive crowds his talents draw,
They hear him speak-the oracle of law.
The father who designs his babe a priest,
Dreams him episcopally such at least,              365
And while the playful jockey scours the room
Briskly, astride upon the parlour broom,
In fancy sees him more superbly ride
In coach with purple lined and mitres on its side.
Events improbable and strange as these,            370
Which only a parental eye foresees,
A public school shall bring to pass with ease.
But how? resides such virtue in that air,
As must create an appetite for prayer?
And will it breathe into him all the zeal          375
That candidates for such a prize should feel,
To take the lead and be the foremost still
In all true worth and literary skill?
'Ah blind to bright futurity, untaught
'The knowledge of the world, and dull of thought!  380
'Church-ladders are not always mounted best
'By learned clerks, and Latinists professed.
'The exalted prize demands an upward look,
'Not to be found by poring on a book.
'Small skill in Latin, and still less in Greek,    385




158


TIR OCINI UM;


' Is more than adequate to all I seek.
'Let erudition grace him or not grace,
'I give the bauble but the second place,
'His wealth, fame, honours, all that I intend,
'Subsist and centre in one point-a friend.         390
'A friend, whate'er he studies or neglects,
'Shall give him consequence, heal all defects.
'His intercourse with peers, and sons of peers'There dawns the splendour of his future years,
'In that bright quarter his propitious skies       395
'Shall blush betimes, and there his glory rise.
"' Your Lordship!" and " Your Grace!" what school can teach
'A rhetoric equal to those parts of speech?
'What need of Homer's verse, or Tully's prose,
'Sweet interjections! if he learn but those?       400
'Let reverend churls his ignorance rebuke,
'Who starve upon a dog's-ear'd Pentateuch,
'The parson knows enough who knows a Duke.' \
Egregious purpose! worthily begun
In barbarous prostitution of your son;             405
Pressed on his part by means that would disgrace
A scrivener's clerk, or footman out of place,
And ending, if at last its end be gained,
In sacrilege, in God's own house profaned.
It may succeed; and if his sins should call        410
For more than common punishment, it shall.
The wretch shall rise, and be the thing on earth
Least qualified in honour, learning, worth,
To occupy a sacred, awful post,
In which the best and worthiest tremble most.     4VS
The royal letters are a thing of course,
A king, that would, might recommend his horse,
And Deans, no doubt, and Chapters, with one voice,
As bound in duty, would confirm the choice.
Behold your Bishop! well he plays his part,        420
Christian in name, and infidel in heart,
Ghostly in office, earthly in his plan,
A slave at court, elsewhere a lady's man,




OR, A REVIEW     OF SCHOOLS.          I59
Dumb as a senator, and as a priest
A piece of mere church-furniture at best;         425
To live estranged from God his total scope,
And his end sure, without one glimpse of hope.
But fair although and feasible it seem,
Depend not much upon your golden dream;
For Providence, that seems concerned to exempt    430
The hallowed bench from absolute contempt,
In spite of all the wrigglers into place,
Still keeps a seat or two for worth and grace;
And therefore 'tis, that, though the sight be rare,
We sometimes see a Lowth or Bagot there.          435
Besides, school-friendships are not always found,
Though fair in promise, permanent and sound;
The most disinterested and virtuous minds,
In early years connected, time unbinds;
New situations give a different cast              440
Of habit, inclination, temper, taste;
And he that seemed our counterpart at first,
Soon shows the strong similitude reversed.
Young heads are giddy, and young hearts are warm,
And make mistakes for manhood to reform.          445
Boys are, at best, but pretty buds unblown,
Whose scent and hues are rather guessed than known;
Each dreams that each is just what he appears,
But learns his error in maturer years,
When disposition, like a sail unfurled,           450
Shows all its rents and patches to the world.
If therefore, even when honest in design,
A boyish friendship may so soon decline,
'Twere wiser sure to inspire a little heart
With just abhorrence of so mean a part,           455
Than set your son to work at a vile trade
For wages so unlikely to be paid.
Our public hives of puerile resort,
That are of chief and most approved report,
To such base hopes, in many a sordid soul,        460
Owe their repute in part, but not the whole.




I 60


TIR OCINI UM;


A principle, whose proud pretensions pass
Unquestioned, though the jewel be but glass,
That with a world, not often over-nice,
Ranks as a virtue, and is yet a vice,              465
Or rather a gross compound, justly tried,
Of envy, hatred, jealousy and pride,
Contributes most perhaps to enhance their fame,
i-And EmulWioo is its specious name.
Boys, once on fire with that contentious zeal,      470
Feel all the rage that female rivals feel,
The prize of beauty in a woman's eyes
Not brighter than in theirs the scholar's prize.
The spirit of that competition burns
With all varieties of ill by turns,                 475
Each vainly magnifies his own success,
Resents his fellow's, wishes it were less,
Exults in his miscarriage if he fail,
Deems his reward too great if he prevail,
And labours to surpass him day and night,           480
Less for improvement than to tickle spite.
The spur is powerful, and I grant its force,
It pricks the genius forward in its course,
Allows short time for play, and none for sloth,
And felt alike by each, advances both,              485
But judge, where so much evil intervenes,
The, end, though plausible, not worth the means.
Weigh, for a moment, classical desert
Against a'heart depraved and temper hurt,
Hurt too perhaps for life, for early wrong          490
Done to the nobler part affects it long;
And you are staunch indeed in learning's caule
If you can crown a discipline that draws
Such mischiefs after it, with much applause.
Connexion formed for interest, and endeared       495
By selfish views, thus censured and cashiered;
And Emulation, as engendering hate,
Doomed to a no less ignominious fate:
The props of such proud seminaries fall,




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


i6i


The Jachin and the Boaz of them all.               500
Great schools rejected then, as those that swell
Beyond a size that can be managed well,
Shall royal institutions miss the bays,
And small academies win all the praise?
Force not my drift beyond its just intent,         505
I praise a school as Pope a government;
So take my judgment in his language dressed,
'Whate'er is best administered, is best.'
Few boys are born with talents that excel,
But all are capable of living well;                510
Then ask not, whether limited or large?
But, watch they strictly, or neglect their charge?
If anxious only that their boys may learn,
While morals languish, a despised concern,
The great and small deserve one common blame,      515
Different in size, but in effect the same.
Much zeal in virtue's cause all teachers boast,
Though motives of mere lucre sway the most;
Therefore in towns and cities they abound,
For there the game they seek is easiest found,     520
Though there, in spite of all that care can do,
Traps to catch youth are most abundant too.
If shrewd, and of a well-constructed brain,
Keen in pursuit, and vigorous to retain,
Your son come forth a prodigy of skill;            525
As wheresoever taught, so formed, he will,
The pedagogue, with self-complacent air,
Claims more than half the praise as his due share;
But if, with all his genius, he betray,
Not more intelligent than loose and gay,           530
Such vicious habits as disgrace his name,
Threaten his health, his fortune, and his fame,
Though want of due restraint alone have bred
The symptoms that you see with so much dread,
Unenvied there, he may sustain alone               535
The whole reproach, the fault was all his own.
Oh! 'tis a sight to be with joy perused,
VOL. II.                M




i62


TIROCINIUM;


By all whom sentiment has not abused,
New-fangled sentiment, the boasted grace
Of those who never feel in the right place,        540
A sight surpassed by none that we can show,
Though Vestris on one leg still shine below,
A father blest with an ingenuous son,
Father, and friend, and tutor, all in one.
How!-turn again to tales long since forgot,         545
JEsop, and Phaedrus, and the rest?-Why not?
He will not blush, that has a father's heart,
To take in childish plays a childish part,
But bends his sturdy back to any toy
That youth takes pleasure in, to please his boy;    550
Then why resign into a stranger's hand
A task as much within your own command,
That God and Nature, and your interest too,
Seem with one voice to delegate to you?
Why hire a lodging in a house unknown               555
For one whose tenderest thoughts all hover round your own?
This second weaning, needless as it is,
How does it lacerate both your heart and his!
The indented stick, that loses day by day
Notch after notch till all are smoothed away,       56o
Bears witness, long ere his dismission come,
With what intense desire he wants his home.
But though the joys he hopes beneath your roof
Bid fair enough to answer in the proof,
Harmless, and safe, and natural, as they are,       565
A disappointment waits him even there:
Arrived, he feels an unexpected change,
He blushes, hangs his head, is shy, and strange,
No longer takes, as once, with fearless ease,
His favourite stand between his father's knees,     570
But seeks the corner of some distant seat,
And eyes the door, and watches a retreat,
And least familiar where he should be most,
Feels all his happiest privileges lost.
Alas, poor boy!-the natural effect                 575




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


i63


Of love by absence chilled into respect.
Say, what accomplishments, at school acquired,
Brings he to sweeten fruits so undesired?
Thou well deservest an alienated son,
Unless thy conscious heart acknowledge-none;      580
None that, in thy domestic snug recess,
He had not made his own with more address,
Though some, perhaps, that shock thy feeling mind,
And better never learned, or left behind.
Add too, that thus estranged, thou canst obtain   585
By no kind arts his confidence again;
That here begins with most that long complaint
Of filial frankness lost, and love grown faint,
Which, oft neglected, in life's waning years
A parent pours into regardless ears.              590
Like caterpillars dangling under trees
By slender threads, and swinging in the breeze,
Which filthily bewray and sore disgrace
The boughs in which are bred the unseemly race,
While every worm industriously weaves             595
And winds his web about the rivelled leaves;
So numerous are the follies that annoy
The mind and heart of every sprightly boy;
Imaginations noxious and perverse,
Which admonition can alone disperse.              6oo
The encroaching nuisance asks a faithful hand,
Patient, affectionate, of high command,
To check the procreation of a breed
Sure to exhaust the plant on which they feed.
'Tis not enough that Greek or Roman page,         605
At stated hours, his freakish thoughts engage;
Even in his pastimes he requires a friend
To warn, and teach him safely to unbend,
O'er all his pleasures gently to preside,
Watch his emotions and control their tide,       s6xo
And levying thus, and with an easy sway,
A tax of profit from his very play,
To impress a value, not to be erased,
M 2




i64


TIROCINIUM;


On moments squandered else, and running all to waste.
And seems it nothing in a father's eye            615
That unimproved those many moments fly?
And is he well content his son should find
No nourishment to feed his growing mind,
But conjugated verbs, and nouns declined?
For such is all the mental food purveyed          620
By public hackneys in the schooling trade;
Who feed a pupil's intellect with store
Of syntax, truly, but with little more,
Dismiss their cares when they dismiss their flock,
Machines themselves, and governed by a clock.     625
Perhaps a father, blessed with any brains,
Would deem it no abuse, or waste of pains,
To improve this diet, at no great expense,
With savoury truth and wholesome common sense;
To lead his son, for prospects of delight,        630
To some not steep, though philosophic, height,
Thence to exhibit to his wondering eyes
Yon circling worlds, their distance, and their size,
The moon of Jove, and Saturn's belted ball,
And the harmonious order of them all;             635
To show him in an insect, or a flower,
Such microscopic proof of skill and power,
As, hid from ages past, God now displays
To combat atheists with in modern days;
To spread the earth before him and commend,       640
With designation of the finger's end,
Its various parts to his attentive note,
Thus bringing home to him the most remote;
To teach his heart to glow with generous flame,
-Caught from the deeds of men of ancient fame;     645
And, more than all, with commendation due,
To set some living worthy in his view,
Whose fair example may at once inspire
A wish to copy what he must admire.
Such knowledge, gained betimes, and which appears,  65o
Though solid, not too weighty for his years,




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


I65


Sweet in itself, and not forbidding sport,
When health demands it, of athletic sort,
Would make him what some lovely boys have been,
And more than one perhaps that I have seen,       655
An evidence and reprehension both
Of the mere schoolboy's lean and tardy growth.
Art thou a man professionally tied,
With all thy faculties elsewhere applied,
Too busy to intend a meaner care                  660
Than how to enrich thyself, and next, thine heir;
Or art thou (as, though rich, perhaps thou art)
But poor in knowledge, having none to impart:
Behold that figure, neat, though plainly clad,
His sprightly mingled with a shade of sad;        665
Not of a nimble tongue, though now and then
Heard to articulate like other men,
No jester, and yet lively in discourse,
His phrase well-chosen, clear, and full of force,
And his address, if not quite French in ease,     670
Not English stiff, but frank, and formed to please,
Low in the world, because he scorns its arts,
A man of letters, manners, morals, parts,
Unpatronised, and therefore little known,
Wise for himself and his few friends alone-       675
In him thy well-appointed proxy see,
Armed for a work too difficult for thee;
Prepared by taste, by learning, and true worth,
To form thy son, to strike his genius forth,
Beneath thy roof, beneath thine eye, to prove     68o
The force of discipline when backed by love,
To double all thy pleasure in thy child,
His mind informed, his morals undefiled.
Safe under such a wing, the boy shall show
No spots contracted among grooms below,           685
Nor taint his speech with meannesses, designed
By footman Tom for witty and refined.
There, in his commerce with the liveried herd,
Lurks the contagion chiefly to be feared;




I66


TIROCINIUM;


For since (so fashion dictates) all, who claim    690
A higher than a mere plebeian fame,
Find it expedient, come what mischief may,
To entertain a thief or two in pay,
And they that can afford the expense of more,
Some half a dozen, and some half a score,         695
Great cause occurs to save him from a band
So sure to spoil him, and so near at hand,
A point secured, if once he be supplied
With some such Mentor always at his side.
Are such men rare? perhaps they would abound      700
WVere occupation easier to be found,
Were education, cise so sure to fail,
Conducted on a manageable scale,
n~d schools, that have outlived all just esteem,
Exchanged for the secure domestic scheme.-        705
But having found him, be thou Duke or Earl,
Show thou hast sense enough to prize the pearl,
And as thou wouldst the advancement of thine heir
In all good faculties beneath his care,
Respect, as is but rational and just,             710
A man deemed worthy of so dear a trust.
Despised by thee, what more can he expect
From youthful folly, than the same neglect?
A flat and fatal negative obtains
That instant, upon all his future pains;          715
His lessons tire, his mild rebukes offend,
And all the instructions of thy son's best friend
Are a stream choked, or trickling to no end.
Doom him not then to solitary meals,
But recollect that he has sense, and feels,       720
And that, possessor of a soul refined,
An upright heart, and cultivated mind,
His post not mean, his talents not unknown,
He deems it hard to vegetate alone.
And if admitted at thy board he sit,              725
Account him no just mark for idle wit,
Offend him not, whom modesty restrains




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


i67


From repartee, with jokes that he disdains,
Much less transfix his feelings with an oath,
Nor frown, unless he vanish with the cloth.-      730
And trust me, his utility may reach
To more than he is hired or bound to teach,
Much trash unuttered, and some ills undone,
Through reverence of the censor of thy son.
But, if thy table be indeed unclean,            735
Foul with excess, and with discourse obscene,
And thou a wretch, whom, following her old plan,
The world accounts an honourable man,
Because forsooth thy courage has been tried
And stood the test, perhaps on the wrong side;    740
Though thou hadst never grace enough to prove
That anything but vice could win thy love;Or hast thou a polite, card-playing wife,
Chained to the routs that she frequents for life;
Who, just when industry begins to snore,          745
Flies, winged with joy, to some coach-crowded door;
And thrice in every winter throngs thine own
With half the chariots and sedans in town,
Thyself meanwhile e'en shifting as thou mayst,
Not very sober though, nor very chaste;-          750
Or is thine house, though less superb thy rank,
If not a scene of pleasure, a mere blank,
And thou at best, and in thy soberest mood,
A trifler vain, and empty of all g6od?
Though mercy for thyself thou canst have none,    755
Hear Nature plead, show mercy to thy sorn;
Saved from his home, where every day brings forth
Some mischief fatal to his future worth,
Find him a better in a distant spot,\
Within some pious pastor's humble cot,            760
Where vile example (yours I chiefly mean,
The most seducing, and the oftenest seen)
May never more be stamped upon his breast,
Not yet perhaps incurably impressed.
Where early rest makes early rising sure,         765




I68


TIROCINIUM;


Disease or comes not, or finds easy cure,
Prevented much by diet neat and plain;
Or if it enter, soon starved out again:
Where all the attention of his faithful host,
Discreetly limited to two at most,                770
May raise such fruits as shall reward his care,
And not at last evaporate in air:
Where, stillness aiding study, and his mind
Serene, and to his duties much inclined,
Not occupied in day-dreams, as at home,           775
Of pleasures past, or follies yet to come,
His virtuous toil may terminate at last
In settled habit and decided taste.But whom do I advise? the fashion-led,
The incorrigibly wrong, the deaf, the dead!       780
Whom care and cool deliberation suit
Not better much than spectacles a brute:
Who if their sons some slight tuition share,
Deem it of no great moment whose, or where;
Too proud to adopt the thoughts of one unknown,   785
And much too gay to have any of their own.
But courage, man! methought the Muse replied,
Mankind are various, and the world is wide:
The ostrich, silliest of the feathered kind,
And formed of God without a parent's mind,        790
Commits her eggs, incautious, to the dust,
Forgetful that the foot may crush the trust;
And while on public nurseries they rely,
Not knowing, and too oft not caring, why,
Irrational in what they thus prefer,              795
No few, that would seem wise, resemble her.
But all are not alike. Thy warning voice
May here and there prevent erroneous choice;
And some perhaps, who, busy as they are,
Yet make their progeny their dearest care         800
(Whose hearts will ache, once told what ills may reach
Their offspring, left upon so wild a beach),
Will need no stress of argument to enforce




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


i69


The expedience of a less adventurous course:
The rest will slight thy counsel, or condemn;     805
But they have human feelings-turn to them.
To you, then, tenants of life's middle state,
Securely placed between the small and great,
Whose character, yet undebauched, retains
Two thirds of all the virtue that remains,        8xo
Who wise yourselves, desire your sons should learn
Your wisdom and your ways-to you I turn.
Look round you on a world perversely blind;
See what contempt is fallen on humankind;
See wealth abused, and dignities misplaced,       815
Great titles, offices, and trusts disgraced,
Long lines of ancestry, renowned of old,
Their noble qualities all quenched and cold;
See Bedlam's closeted and handcuffed charge
Surpassed in frenzy by the mad at large;          820
See great commanders making war a trade,
Great lawyers, lawyers without study made:
Churchmen, in whose esteem their best employ
Is odious, and their wages all their joy,
Who far enough from furnishing their shelves      825
With Gospel lore, turn infidels themselves;
See womanhood despised, and manhood shamed
With infamy too nauseous to be named,
Fops at all corners, ladylike in mien,
Civeted fellows, smelt ere they are seen,         830
Else coarse and rude in manners, and their tongue
On fire with curses, and with nonsense hung,
Now flushed with drunkenness, now with whoredom pale,
Their breath a sample of last night's regale;
See volunteers in all the vilest arts,            833
Men well endowed, of honourable parts,
Designed by Nature wise, but self-made fools;
All these, and more like these, were bred at schools.
And if it chance, as sometimes chance it will,
That though school-bred the boy be virtuous still,  840
Such rare exceptions, shining in the dark,




170


TIROCINIUM;


Prove, rather than impeach, the just remark,
As here and there a twinkling star descried
Serves but to show how black is all beside.
Now look on him, whose very voice in tone         845
Just echoes thine, whose features are thine own,
And stroke his polished cheek of purest red,
And lay thine hand upon his flaxen head,
And say,-' My boy, the unwelcome hour is come,
'When thou, transplanted from thy genial home,    850
'Must find a colder soil and bleaker air,
'And trust for safety to a stranger's care.
'What character, what turn, thou wilt assume
'From constant converse with I know not whom;
'Who there will court thy friendship, with what views, 855
'And, artless as thou art, whom thou wilt choose;
'Though much depends on what thy choice shall be
'Is all chance-medley, and unknown to me.' —
Canst thou, the tear just trembling on thy lids,
And while the dreadful risk foreseen forbids;     86o
Free, too, and under no constraining force,
Unless the sway of custom warp thy course;
Lay such a stake upon the losing side,
Merely to gratify so blind a guide?
Thou canst not! Nature, pulling at thine heart,   86 -Condemns the unfatherly, the imprudent part.
Thou wouldst not, deaf to Nature's tenderest plea,
Turn him adrift upon a rolling sea,
Nor say,-'Go thither;'-conscious that there lay
A brood of asps, or quicksands, in his way;       870
Then, only governed by the self-same rule.
Of natural pity, send him not to school.
No!-guard him better. Is he not thine own,
Thyself in miniature, thy flesh, thy bone?
And hopest thou not ('tis every father's hope)    875
That since thy strength must with thy years elope,
And thou wilt need some comfort to assuage
Health's last farewell, a staff of thine old age,
That then, in recompense of all thy cares,




OR, A REVIEW OF SCHOOLS.


171


Thy child shall show respect to thy gray hairs,    88o
Befriend thee, of all other friends bereft,
And give thy life its only cordial left?
Aware then how much danger intervenes,
To compass that good end, forecast the means.
His heart, now passive, yields to thy command;      885
Secure it thine, its key is in thine hand.
If thou desert thy charge, and throw it wide,
Nor heed what guests there enter and abide,
Complain not if attachments lewd and base
Supplant thee in it, and usurp thy place.          890
But if thou guard its sacred chambers sure
From vicious inmates and delights impure,
Either his gratitude shall hold him fast,
And keep him warm and filial to the last;'
Or if he prove unkind (as who can say,              895
But being man, and therefore frail, he may)
One comfort yet shall cheer thine aged heart;Howe'er he slight thee, thou hast done thy part.
' Oh, barbarous! wouldst thou with a Gothic hand
Pull down the schools-what!-all the schools i' th' land; 9oo
Or throw them up to livery-nags and grooms,
Or turn them into shops and auction rooms?'
A captious question, sir, and yours is one,
Deserves an answer similar, or none.
Wouldst thou, possessor of a flock, employ          905
(Apprised that he is such) a careless boy,
And feed him well, and give him handsome pay,
Merely to sleep, and let them run astray?
Survey our schools and colleges, and see
A sight not much unlike my simile.                  910
From education, as the leading cause,
The public character its colour draws;
Thence the prevailing manners take their cast,
Extravagant or sober, loose or chaste.
And, though I would not advertise them yet,        915
Nor write on each-'This building to be let,'
Unless the world were all prepared to embrace




172                 TIROCINIUM.
A plan well worthy to supply their place;
Yet, backward as they are, and long have been,
To cultivate and keep the MORALS clean            920
(Forgive the crime), I wish them, I confess,
Or better managed, or encouraged less.




MINOR POEMS.








AN EPISTLE TO JOSEPH HILL, ESQ.
DEAR Joseph-five and twenty years agoAlas, how time escapes!-'tis even so
With frequent intercourse, and always sweet,
And always friendly, we were wont to cheat
A tedious hour-and now we never meet!              5
As some grave gentleman in Terence says,
('Twas therefore much the same in ancient days)
Good lack, we know not what to-morrow bringsStrange fluctuation of all human things!
True. Changes will befall, and friends may part,  IO
But distance only cannot change the heart:
And were I called to prove the assertion true,
One proof should serve-a reference to you.
Whence comes it then, that in the wane of life,
Though nothing have occurred to kindle strife,     15
We find the friends we fancied we had won,
Though numerous once, reduced to few or none?
Can gold grow worthless that has stood the touch?
No; gold they seemed, but they were never such.
Horatio's servant once, with bow and cringe,    20
Swinging the parlour door upon its hinge,
Dreading a negative, and overawed
Lest he should trespass, begged to go abroad.
'Go, fellow! whither?'-turning short about'Nay-stay at home-you're always going out.'       25
'Tis but a step, sir, just at the street's end.''For what?'-'An please you, sir, to see a friend.'



I76     AN EPISTLE TO yOSEPH HILL, ESQ.
'A friend!' Horatio cried, and seemed to start'Yea, marry shalt thou, and with all my heart.
'And fetch my cloak; for, though the night be raw,  30
I'll see him too-the first I ever saw.'
I knew the man, and knew his nature mild,
And was his plaything often when a child;
But somewhat at that moment pinched him close,
Else he was seldom bitter or morose.               35
Perhaps his confidence just then betrayed,
His grief might prompt him with the speech he made;
Perhaps 'twas mere good hunmour gave it birth,
The harmless play of pleasantry and mirth.
Howe'er it was, his language, in my mind,          40
Bespoke at least a man that knew mankind.
But not to moralize too much, and strain
To prove an evil of which all complain,
(I hate long arguments verbosely spun);
One story more, dear Hill, and I have done.        45
Once on a time an Emperor, a wise man,
No matter where, in China or Japan,
Decreed that whosoever should offend
Against the well-known duties of a friend,
Convicted once, should ever after wear             50
But half a coat, and show his bosom bare.
The punishment importing this, no doubt,
That all was naught within, and all found out.
Oh, happy Britain! we have not to fear
Such hard and arbitrary measure here;              55
Else, could a law like that which I relate,
Once have the sanction of our triple state,
Some few that I have known in days of old,
Would run most dreadful risk of catching cold;
While you, my friend, whatever wind should blow,   60
Might traverse England safely to and fro,
An honest man, close-buttoned to the chin,
Broad-cloth without, and a warm heart within.




ODE TO APOLLO.


177


ODE TO APOLLO.
ON AN INKGLASS ALMOST DRIED IN THE SUN.
PATRON of all those luckless brains,
That to the wrong side leaning,
Indite much metre with much pains,
And little or no meaning.
Ah! why, since oceans, rivers, streams,     5
That water all the nations,
Pay tribute to thy glorious beams,
In constant exhalations;
Why, stooping from the noon of day
Too covetous of drink,                   IO
Apollo, hast thou stolen away
A poet's drop of ink?
Upborne into the viewless air,
It floats a vapour now,
Impelled through regions dense and rare    15
By all the winds that blow.
Ordained perhaps, ere summer flies,
Combined with millions more,
To form an Iris in the skies,
Though black and foul before.            20
Illustrious drop! and happy then,
Beyond the happiest lot
Of all that ever passed my pen,
So soon to be forgot.
Phcebus, if such be thy design,            25
To place it in thy bow,
Give wit, that what is left may shine
With equal grace below.


VOL. II.


N




178


THE FAITHFUL BIRD.


THE FAITHFUL BIRD.
THE greenhouse is my summer seat;
My shrubs displaced from that retreat
Enjoyed the open air;
Two goldfinches, whose sprightly song
Had been their mutual solace long,          5
Lived happy prisoners there.
They sang, as blithe as finches sing
That flutter loose on golden wing,
And frolic where they list;
Strangers to liberty, 'tis true,          o1
But that delight they never knew,
And therefore never missed.
But Nature works in every breast,
With force not easily suppressed;
And Dick felt some desires,            15
That, after many an effort vain,
Instructed him at length to gain
A pass between his wires.
The open windows seemed to invite
The freeman to a farewell flight;          20
But Tom was still confined;
And Dick, although his way was clear,
Was much too generous and sincere
To leave his friend behind.
So settling on his cage, by play,          25
And chirp, and kiss, he seemed to say
You must not live aloneNor would he quit that chosen stand
Till I, with slow and cautious hand,
Returned him to his own.               30
O ye, who never taste the joys
Of Friendship, satisfied with noise,




PAIRING TIME ANTICIPATED.


17 9


Fandango, ball, and rout!
Blush when I tell you how a bird
A prison with a friend preferred           35
To Liberty without.
PAIRING TIME ANTICIPATED.
A FABLE.
I SHALL not ask Jean Jacques Rousseau
If birds confabulate or no;
'Tis clear that they were always able
To hold discourse, at least in fable;
And e'en the child who knows no better,         5
Than to interpret by the letter
A story of a cock and bull,
Must have a most uncommon skull.
It chanced then on a winter's day,
But warm, and bright, and calm as May,         1o
The birds, conceiving a design
To forestall sweet St. Valentine,
In many an orchard, copse, and grove,
Assembled on affairs of love,
And wxith much twitter, and much chatter,      I5
Began to agitate the matter.
At length a Bullfinch, who could boast
More years and wisdom than the most,
Entreated, opening wide his beak,
A moment's liberty to speak;                   20
And, silence publicly enjoined,
Delivered briefly thus his mind:
' My friends! be cautious how ye treat
The subject upon which we meet;
I fear we shall have winter yet.'
A Finch whose tongue knew no control,        25
With golden wing and satin poll,
A last year's bird, who ne'er had tried
What marriage means, thus pert replied:
N 2




I SO


PAIRING TIME ANTICIPATED.


'Methinks the gentleman,' quoth she,          30
'Opposite in the apple-tree,
By his good will would keep us single,
Till yonder heaven and earth shall mingle,
Or (which is likelier to befall)
Till death exterminate us all.                  35
I marry without more ado;
My dear Dick Redcap, what say you?'
Dick heard, and tweedling, ogling, bridling,
Turning short round, strutting, and sideling,
Attested, glad, his approbation                 40
Of an immediate conjugation.
Their sentiments so well expressed
Influenced mightily the rest,
All paired, and each pair built a nest.
But though the birds were thus in haste,      45
The leaves came on not quite so fast,
And Destiny, that sometimes bears
An aspect stern on man's affairs,
Not altogether smiled on theirs.
The wind, of late breathed gently forth,        50
Now shifted east, and east by north;
Bare trees and shrubs but ill, you know,
Could shelter them from rain or snow,
Stepping into their nests, they paddled,
Themselves were chilled, their eggs were addled:  55
Soon every father-bird and mother
Grew quarrelsome, and pecked each other,
Parted without the least regret,
Except that they had ever met,
And learned in future to be wiser,              6o
Than to neglect a good adviser.
MORAL.
Misses! the tale that I relate
This lesson seems to carryChoose not alone a proper mate,
But proper time to marry.                   65




THE NEEDLESS ALARM.


i8i


THE NEEDLESS ALARM.
A TALE.
THERE is a field, through which I often pass,
Thick overspread with moss and silky grass,
Adjoining close to Kilwick's echoing wood,
Where oft the bitch-fox hides her hapless brood,
Reserved to solace many a neighbouring squire,      5
That he may follow them through brake and brier,
Contusion hazarding of neck or spine,
Which rural gentlemen call sport divine,
A narrow brook, by rushy banks concealed,
Runs in a bottom, and divides the field;           lo
Oaks intersperse it, that had once a head,
But now wear crests of oven-wood instead;
And where the land slopes to its watery bourn
Wide yawns a gulf beside a ragged thorn;
Bricks line the sides, but shivered long ago,
And horrid brambles intertwine below;
A hollow scooped, I judge, in ancient time,
For baking earth, or burning rock to lime.
Not yet the hawthorn bore her berries red,
With which the fieldfare, wintry guest, is fed;    20
Nor Autumn yet had brushed from every spray,
With her chill hand, the mellow leaves away;
But corn was housed, and beans were in the stack,
Now therefore issued forth the spotted pack,
With tails high mounted, ears hung low, and throats  25
With a whole gamut filled of heavenly notes,
For which, alas! my destiny severe,
Though ears she gave me two, gave me no ear.
The sun accomplishing his early march,
His lamp now planted on Heaven's topmost arch,     30
When, exercise and air my only aim,
And heedless whither, to that field I came,
Ere yet with ruthless joy the happy hound
Told hill and dale that Reynard's track was found,




I82


THE NEEDLESS ALARM.


Or with the high-raised horn's melodious clang     35
All Kilwick and all Dinglederry rang.
Sheep grazed the field; some with soft bosom pressed
The herb as soft, while nibbling strayed the rest;
Nor noise was heard but of the hasty brook,
Struggling, detained in many a petty nook.         40
All seemed so peaceful, that from them conveyed,
To me their peace by kind contagion spread.
But when the huntsman, with distended cheek,
'Gan make his instrument of music speak,
And from within the wood that crash was heard,     45
Though not a hound from whom it burst appeared,
The sheep recumbent, and the sheep that grazed,
All huddling into phalanx, stood and gazed,
Admiring, terrified, the novel strain,
Then coursed the field around, and coursed it round again;
But recollecting, with a sudden thought,           51
That flight in circles urged advanced them nought,
They gathered close around the old pit's brink,
And thought again-but knew not what to think.
The man to solitude accustomed long,             55
Perceives in every thing that lives a tongue;
Not animals alone, but shrubs and trees
Have speech for him, and understood with ease;
After long drought, when rains abundant fall,
He hears the herbs and flowers rejoicing all;      6o
Knows what the freshness of their hue implies,
How glad they catch the largess of the skies;
But, with precision nicer still, the mind
He scans of every locomotive kind;
Birds of all feather, beasts of every name,        65
That serve mankind, or shun them, wild or tame;
The looks and gestures of their griefs and fears
Have all articulation in his ears;
He spells them true by intuition's light,
And needs no glossary to set him right.            70
This truth premised was needful as a text,
To win due credence to what follows next.




THE NEEDLESS ALARM.,83


Awhile they mused; surveying every face,
Thou hadst supposed them of superior race;
Their periwigs of wool and fears combined,         75
Stamped on each countenance such marks of mind,
That sage they seemed, as lawyers o'er a doubt,
Which, puzzling long, at last they puzzle out;
Or academic tutors, teaching youths,
Sure ne'er to want them, mathematic truths;        80
When thus a mutton statelier than the rest,
A ram, the ewes and wethers, sad, addressed:
'Friends! we have lived too long. I never heard
Sounds such as these, so worthy to be feared.
Could I believe, that winds for ages pent          85
In earth's dark womb have found at last a vent,
And from their prison-house below arise,
With all these hideous howlings to the skies,
I could be much composed, nor should appear,
For such a cause, to feel the slightest fear.      90
Yourselves have seen, what time the thunders rolled
All night, me resting quiet in the fold.
Or heard we that tremendous bray alone,
I could expound the melancholy tone;
Should deem it by our old companion made,          95
The ass; for he, we know, has lately strayed,
And being lost, perhaps, and wandering wide,
Might be supposed to clamour for a guide.
But ah! those dreadful yells what soul can hear,
That owns a carcass, and not quake for fear?      IOo
Demons produce them doubtless, brazen-clawed,
And fanged with brass the demons are abroad;
I hold it therefore wisest and most fit
That, life to save, we leap into the pit.'
Him answered then his loving mate and true,     o05
But more discreet than he, a Cambrian ewe:
'How! leap into the pit our life to save!
To save our life leap all into the grave!
For can we find it less? Contemplate first
The depth, how awful! falling there, we burst:    nIo




I84 THE YEARLY DISTRESS; OR, TITHING TIME,
Or should the brambles, interposed, our fall
In part abate, that happiness were small;
For with a race like theirs no chance I see
Of peace or ease to creatures clad as we.
Meantime, noise kills not. Be it Dapple's bray,     115
Or be it not, or be it whose it may,
And rush those other sounds, that seem by tongues
Of demons uttered, from whatever lungs,
Sounds are but sounds, and till the cause appear,
We have at least commodious standing here.          I20
Come fiend, come fury, giant, monster, blast
From earth or hell, we can but plunge at last.'
While thus she-spake, I fainter heard the peals,
For Reynard, close attended at his heels
By panting dog, tired man, and spattered horse,     125
Through mere good fortune, took a different course.
The flock grew calm again, and I, the road
Following, that led me to my own abode,
Much wondered that the silly sheep had found
Such cause of terror in an empty sound              130
So sweet to huntsman, gentleman, and hound.
MORAL.
Beware of desperate steps. The darkest day,
Live till to-morrow, will have passed away.
THE YEARLY DISTRESS; OR, TITHING
TIME, AT STOCK, IN ESSEX.
Verses addressed to a Country Clergyman complaining of the disagreeableness of the day annually appointed for receiving the Dues at the
Parsonage.
COME, ponder well, for 'tis no jest,
To laugh it would be wrong,
The troubles of a worthy priest,
The burden of my song.




A T STOCk, IN ESSEX.


185


This priest he merry is and blithe          5
Three quarters of a year,
But oh! it cuts him like a scythe,
When tithing time draws near.
He then is full of fright and fears
As one at point to die,                  Io
And long before the day appears,
He heaves up many a sigh.
For then the farmers come jog, jog,
Along the miry road,
Each heart as heavy as a log,              15
To make their payments good.
In sooth the sorrow of such days
Is not to be expressed,
When he that takes, and he that pays,
Are both alike distressed.               20
Now, all unwelcome at his gates,
The clumsy swains alight,
With rueful faces and bald patesHe trembles at the sight.
And well he may, for well he knows         25
Each bumpkin of the clan,
Instead of paying what he owes,
Will cheat him if he can.
So in they come-each makes his leg,
And flings his head before,              30
And looks as if he came to beg,
And not to quit a score.
'And how does miss and madam do,
The little boy and all?'
'All tight and well. And how do you,       35
Good Mr. What-d'ye-call '




I86


THE YEARLY DISTRESS, ETC.


The dinner comes, and down they sit:
Were e'er such hungry folk?
There's little talking, and no wit;
It is no time to joke.                   40
One wipes his nose upon his sleeve,
One spits upon the floor,
Yet, not to give offence or grieve,
Holds up the cloth before.
The punch goes round, and they are dull,   45
And lumpish still as ever;
Like barrels with their bellies full,
They only weigh the heavier.
At length the busy time begins,
'Come,- neighbours, we must wag'         50
The money chinks, down drop their chins,
Each lugging out his bag.
One talks of mildew and of frost,
And one of storms of hail,
And one of pigs that he has lost           55
By maggots at the tail.
Quoth one, 'A rarer man than you
In pulpit none shall hear:
But yet, methinks, to tell you true,
You sell it plaguy dear.'                6o
Oh! why are farmers made so coarse,
Or clergy made so fine?
A kick that scarce would move a horse,
May kill a sound divine.
Then let the boobies stay at home;         65
'Twould cost him, I dare say,
Less trouble taking twice the sum
Without the clowns that pay.




GRATITUDE.


i87


GRATITUDE.
ADDRESSED TO LADY HESKETH.
THIS cap, that so stately appears,
With ribbon-bound tassel on high,
Which seems by the crest that it rears
Ambitious of brushing the sky:
This cap to my cousin I owe,                5
She gave it, and gave me beside,
Wreathed into an elegant bow,
The ribbon with which it is tied.
This wheel-footed studying chair,
Contrived both for toil and repose,     o1
Wide-elbowed, and wadded with hair,
In which I both scribble and dose,
Bright-studded to dazzle the eyes,
And rival in lustre of that
In which, or astronomy lies,               15
Fair Cassiopeia sat:
These carpets, so soft to the foot,
Caledonia's traffic and pride!
Oh spare them, ye knights of the boot,
Escaped from a cross country ride!      o2
This table and mirror within,
Secure from collision and dust,
At which I oft shave cheek and chin,
And periwig nicely adjust:
This moveable structure of shelves,        25
For its beauty admired and its use,
And charged with octavos and twelves,
The gayest I had to produce;
Where, flaming in scarlet and gold,
My poems enchanted I view,               30
And hope, in due time, to behold
My Iliad and Odyssey too:




A88


THE POET'S NEW-YEAR'S GIFT.


This china that decks the alcove,
Which here people call a buffet,
But what the gods call it above            35
Has ne'er been revealed to us yet:
These curtains, that keep the room warm
Or cool, as the season demands,
These stoves that for pattern and form
Seem the labour of Mulciber's hands.     40
All these are not half that I owe
To one, from our earliest youth,
To me ever ready to show
Benignity, friendship, and truth;
For Time, the destroyer declared          45
And foe of our perishing kind,
If even her face he has spared,
Much less could he alter her mind.
Thus compassed about with the goods
And chattels of leisure and ease,        50
I indulge my poetical moods
In many such fancies as these;
And fancies I fear they will seemPoets' goods are not often so fine;
The poets will swear that I dream          55
When I sing of the splendour of mine.
THE POET'S NEW-YEAR'S GIFT.
TO MRS. THROCKMORTON.
MARIA! I have every good
For thee wished many a time,
Both sad and in a cheerful mood,
But never yet in rhyme.




THE NEGRO S COMPLAINT.               I89
To wish thee fairer is no need,              5
More prudent, or more sprightly,
0r more ingenious, or more freed
From temper-flaws unsightly.
What favour then not yet possessed
Can I for thee require,                   IO
In wedded love already blest,
To thy whole heart's desire?
None here is happy but in part:
Full bliss is bliss divine;
There dwells some wish in every heart,      15
And doubtless one in thine.
That wish on some fair future day,
Which fate shall brightly gild.
('Tis blameless, be it what it may)
I wish it all fulfilled.                  20
THE NEGRO'S COMPLAINT.
FORCED from home and all its pleasures,
Afric's coast I left forlorn;
To increase a stranger's treasures,
O'er the raging billows borne.
Men from England bought and sold me,         5
Paid my price in paltry gold;
But, though slave they have enrolled me,
Minds are never to be sold.
Still in thought as free as ever,
What are England's rights, I ask,         IO
Me from my delights to sever,
Me to torture, me to task?




90go


THE NEGRO'S COMPLAINT.


Fleecy locks and black complexion
Cannot forfeit Nature's claim;
Skins may differ, but affection      *     15
Dwells in white and black the same.
Why did all-creating Nature
Make the plant for which we toil?
Sighs must fan it, tears must water,
Sweat of ours must dress the soil.       20
Think, ye masters iron-hearted,
Lolling at your jovial boards,
Think how many backs have smarted,
For the sweets your cane affords.
Is there, as ye sometimes tell us,         25
Is there One who reigns on high?
Has He bid you buy and sell us,
Speaking from his throne, the sky?
Ask him, if your knotted scourges,
Matches, blood-extorting screws,         30
Are the means that duty urges
Agents of his will to use?
Hark! He answers-Wild tornadoes,
Strewing yonder sea with wrecks,
Wasting towns, plantations, meadows,       35
Are the voice with which He speaks.
He, foreseeing what vexations
Afric's sons should undergo,
Fixed their tyrants' habitations
Where his whirlwinds answer-'No.'        40
By our blood in Afric wasted,
Ere our necks received the chain;
By the miseries that we tasted,
Crossing in your barks the main;
By our sufferings, since ye brought us     45
To the man-degrading mart;
All sustained by patience, taught us
Only by a broken heart;




PITY FOR POOR AFRICANS.


191


Deem our nation brutes no longer,
Till some reason ye shall find            50
Worthier of regard, and stronger
Than the colour of our kind.
Slaves of gold, whose sordid dealings
Tarnish all your boasted powers,
Prove that you have human feelings,         55
Ere you proudly question ours!
PITY FOR POOR AFRICANS.
'Video meliora proboque,
Deteriora sequor.'  [OVID, Meiamorph. vii. 20.]
I owN I am shocked at the purchase of slaves,
And fear those who buy them and sell them, are knaves;
What I hear of their hardships, their tortures, and groans,
Is almost enough to draw pity from stones.
I pity them greatly, but I must be mum,              5
For how could we do without sugar and rum?
Especially sugar, so needful we see?
What, give up our desserts, our coffee, and tea!
Besides, if we do, the French, Dutch, and Danes
Will heartily thank us, no doubt, for our pains:     10
If we do not buy the poor creatures, they will,
And tortures and groans will be multiplied still.
If foreigners likewise would give up the trade,
Much more in behalf of your wish might be said:
But while they get riches by purchasing blacks,     15
Pray tell me why we may not also go snacks?
Your scruples and arguments bring to my mind
A story so pat, you may think it is coined,
On purpose to answer you, out of my mint;
But I can assure you I saw it in print.             20




I92


THE MORNING DREAM.


A youngster at school, more sedate than the rest,
Had once his integrity put to the test;
His comrades had plotted an orchard to rob,
And asked him to go and assist in the job.
He was shocked, sir, like you, and answered-' Oh no! 25
What! rob our good neighbour! I pray you don't go;
Besides the man's poor, his orchard's his bread,
Then think of his children, for they must be fed.'
'You speak very fine, and you look very grave,
But apples we want, and apples we'll have;         30
If you will go with us, you shall have a share,
If not, you shall have neither apple nor pear.'
They spoke, and Tom pondered-'I see they will go:
Poor man! what a pity to injure him so!
Poor man! I would save him his fruit if I could,   35
But staying behind will do him no good.
'If the matter depended alone upon me,
His apples might hang till they dropped from the tree;
But since they will take them, I think I'll go too,
He will lose none by me, though I get a few.'      40
His scruples thus silenced, Tom felt more at ease,
And went with his comrades the apples to seize;
He blamed and protested, but joined in the plan:
He shared in the plunder, but pitied the man.
THE MORNING DREAM.
'TwAs in the glad season of spring,
Asleep at the dawn of the day,
I dreamed what I cannot but sing,
So pleasant it seemed as I lay.




THE MORNING DREAM.                 193
I dreamed that, on ocean afloat,              5
Far hence to the westward I sailed,
While the billows high-lifted the boat,
And the fresh-blowing breeze never failed.
In the steerage a woman I saw,
Such at least was the form that she wore,  10
Whose beauty impressed me with awe,
Ne'er taught me by woman before.
She sat, and a shield at her side
Shed light, like a sun on the waves,
And smiling divinely, she cried-             15
'I go to make Freemen of Slaves.'
Then raising her voice to a strain
The sweetest that ear ever heard,
She sung of the slave's broken chain,
Wherever her glory appeared.               20
Some clouds which had over us hung,
Fled, chased by her melody clear,
And methought while she Liberty sung,
'Twas Liberty only to hear.
Thus swiftly dividing the flood,             25
To a slave-cultured island we came,
Where a Demon, her enemy, stoodOppression his terrible nam~.
In his hand, as the sign of his sway,
A scourge hung with lashes he bore,        30
And stood looking out for his prey
From Africa's sorrowful shore.
But soon as approaching the land,
That goddess-like woman he viewed;
The scourge he let fall from his hand,        35
With blood of his subjects imbrued.
I saw him both sicken and die,
And the moment the monster expired,
Heard shouts that ascended the sky,
From thousands with rapture inspired.      40


VrOL. II.


0o




194 ON MRS. MONTA GUS FBA THER-1-ANGJNGS.
Awaking, how could I but muse
At what such a dream should betide?
But soon my ear caught the glad news,
Which served my weak thought for a guide;That Britannia, renowned o'er the waves,     45
For the hatred she ever has shown
To the black-sceptred rulers of slaves,
Resolves to have none of her own.
ON MRS. MONTAGU'S FEATHERHANGINGS.
THE Birds put off their every hue,
To dress a room for Montagu;
The Peacock sends his heavenly dyes,
His rainbows and his starry eyes;
The Pheasant plumes which round infold        5
His mantling neck with downy gold;
The Cock his arched tail's azure show;
And, river-blanched, the Swan his snow;
All tribes beside of Indian name,
That glossy shine, or vivid flame,            Io
Where rises and where sets the day,
Whate'er they boast of rich and gay,
Contribute to the gorgeous plan,
Proud to advance it all they can.
This plumage, neither dashing shower,        I5
Nor blasts that shake the dripping bower,
Shall drench again or discompose,
But screened from every storm that blows,
It boasts a splendour ever new,
Safe with protecting Montagu.                20
To the same Patroness resort,
Secure of favour at her court,




ON MRS. MONTAGU'S FEATHER-HANGINGS. 195
Strong Genius, from whose forge of thought
Forms rise, to quick perfection wrought,
Which, though new-born, with vigour move,    25
Like Pallas springing armed from JoveImagination scattering round
Wild roses over furrowed ground,
Which Labour of his frown beguile,
And teach Philosophy a smile-                30
Wit flashing on Religion's side,
Whose fires, to sacred Truth applied,
The gem, though luminous before,
Obtrude on human notice more,
Like sunbeams on the golden height           35
Of some tall temple playing brightWell tutored Learning, from his books
Dismissed with grave, not haughty, looks,
Their order on his shelves exact,
Nor more harmonious or compact,              40
Than that to which he keeps confined
The various treasures of his mindAll these to Montagu's repair,
Ambitious of a shelter there.
There Genius, Learning, Fancy, Wit,          45
Their ruffled plumage calm refit,
(For stormy troubles loudest roar
Around their flight who highest soar)
And in her eye, and by her aid,
Shine safe without a fear to fade.           50
She thus maintains divided sway'
With yon bright regent of the day;
The Plume and Poet both we know
Their lustre to his influence owe;
And she the works of Phoebus aiding,         55
Both Poet saves and Plume from fading.


O 2




196      THE DOG AND THE WATER LILY.
THE DOG AND THE WATER-LILY.
NO FABLE.
THE noon was shady, and soft airs
Swept Ouse's silent tide,
When, 'scaped from literary cares,
I wandered on his side.
My spaniel, prettiest of his race,           5
And high in pedigree,
(Two nymphs adorned with every grace,
That spaniel found for me)
Now wantoned lost in flags and reeds,
Now starting into sight,                  10
Pursued the swallow o'er the meads
With scarce a slower flight.
It was the time when Ouse displayed
His lilies newly blown;
Their beauties I intent surveyed,           15
And one I wished my own.
With cane extended far, I sought
To steer it close to land;
But still the prize, though nearly caught,
Escaped my eager hand.                    20
Beau marked my unsuccessful pains
With fixed considerate face,
And puzzling set his puppy brains
To comprehend the case.
But with a cherup clear and strong          25
Dispersing all his dream,
I thence withdrew, and followed long
The windings of the stream.




ON MRS. THROCKMORTON'S BULLFINCH.


197


My ramble ended, I returned,
Beau trotting far before,                 30
The floating wreath again discerned,
And plunging left the shore.
I saw him, with that lily cropped,
Impatient swim to meet
My quick approach, and soon he dropped      35
The treasure at my feet.
Charmed with the sight, 'The world,' I cried,
'Shall hear of this thy deed:
My dog shall mortify the pride
Of man's superior breed:                  40
'But chief, myself I will enjoin,
Awake at Duty's call,
To show a love as prompt as thine
To Him who gives me all.'
ON THE DEATH OF MRS. THROCKMORTON'S BULLFINCH.
YE nymphs! if e'er your eyes were red
With tears o'er hapless favourites shed,
Oh! share Maria's grief:
Her favourite, even in his cage,
(What will not hunger's cruel rage?)           5
Assassined by a thief!
Where Rhenus strays his vines among,
The egg was laid from which he sprung:
And though by nature mute,
Or only with a whistle blessed,                10
Well taught, he all the sounds expressed
Of flageolet or flute.




i98 ON MRS. TIIROCKMORTON'S BULLFINCH.
The honours of his ebon poll
Were brighter than the sleekest mole;
His bosom of the hue                   15
With which Aurora decks the skies,
When piping winds shall soon arise,
To sweep away the dew.
Above, below, in all the house,
Dire foe alike of bird and mouse,            20
No cat had leave to dwell;
And Bully's cage supported stood
On props of smoothest shaven wood,
Large built and latticed well.
Well latticed-but the grate, alas!           25
Not rough with wire of steel or brass,
For Bully's plumage sake,
But smooth with wands from Ouse's side,
With which, when neatly peeled and dried,
The swains their baskets make.         30
Night veiled the pole; all seemed secure;
When, led by instinct sharp and sure,
Subsistence to provide,
A beast forth sallied on the scout,
Long backed, long tailed, with whiskered snout, 35
And badger-coloured hide.
He, entering at the study door,
Its ample area 'gan explore;
And something in the wind
Conjectured, sniffing round and round,       40
Better than all the books he found,
Food chiefly for the mind.
Just then, by adverse fate impressed,
A dream disturbed poor Bully's rest;




ON RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE. I 99
In sleep he seemed to view              45
A rat fast clinging to the cage,
And screaming at the sad presage,
Awoke and found it true.
For aided both by ear and scent,
Right to his mark the monster went-           so
Ah, Muse! forbear to speak
Minute the horrors that ensued;
His teeth were strong, the cage was woodHe left poor Bully's beak.
Oh, had he made that too his prey!            55
That beak, whence issued many a lay
Of such mellifluous tone,
Might have repaid him well, I wote,
For silencing so sweet a throat,
Fast stuck within his own.              6o
Maria weeps-the Muses mournSo when, by Bacchanalians torn,
On Thracian Hebrus' side
The tree-enchanter Orpheus fell,
His head alone remained to tell               65
The cruel death he died.
ON THE
RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE
OUT OF NORFOLK,
THE GIFT OF MY COUSIN, ANN BODHAM.
OH that those lips had language! Life has passed
With me but roughly since I heard thee last.
Those lips are thine-thy own sweet smile I see,
The same that oft in childhood solaced me;
Voice only fails, else how distinct they say,      5




200  ON RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE.
'Grieve not, my child, chase all thy fears away!'
The meek intelligence of those dear eyes
(Blest be the Art that can immortalize,The Art that baffles Time's tyrannic claim
To quench it) here shines on me still the same.    I0
Faithful remembrancer of one so dear,
O welcome guest, though unexpected, here!
Who bidst me honour with an artless song,
Affectionate, a mother lost so long.
I will obey, not willingly alone,                  15
But gladly, as the precept were her own:
And while that face renews my filial grief,
Fancy shall weave a charm for my relief,Shall steep me in Elysian reverie,
A momentary dream, that thou art she.              20
My mother! when I learned that thou wast dead,
Say, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed?
Hovered thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son,
Wretch even then, life's journey just begun?
Perhaps thou gavest me, though unfelt, a kiss;     25
Perhaps a tear, if souls can weep in blissAh, that maternal smile! it answers-' Yes.'
I heard the bell tolled on thy burial day,
I saw the hearse that bore thee slow away,
And, turning from my nursery window, drew           30
A long, long sigh, and wept a last adieu!
But was it such?-It was.-Where thou art gone
Adieus and farewells are a sound unknown;
May I but meet thee on that peaceful shore,
The parting word shall pass my lips no more!        3
Thy maidens grieved themselves at my concern,
Oft gave me promise of thy quick return.
What ardently I wished, I long believed,
And, disappointed still, was still deceived;
By expectation every day beguiled,                 40
Dupe of to-morrow even from a child.
Thus many a sad to-morrow came and went,
Till, all my stock of infant sorrow spent,




ON RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE. 201
I learned at last submission to my lot,
But, though I less deplored thee, ne'er forgot.    45
Where once we dwelt our name is heard no more,
Children not thine have trod my nursery floor;
And where the gardener Robin, day by day,
Drew me to school along the public way,
Delighted with my bauble coach, and wrapped        50
In scarlet mantle warm, and velvet capped,
'Tis now become a history little known,
That once we called the pastoral house our own.
Shortlived possession! but the record fair,
That memory keeps of all thy kindness there,       55
Still outlives many a storm that has effaced
A thousand other themes less deeply traced.
Thy nightly visits to my chamber made,
That thou mightest know me safe and warmly laid;
Thy morning bounties ere I left my home,           6o
The biscuit, or confectionary plum;
The fragrant waters on my cheeks bestowed
By thy own hand, till fresh they shone and glowed:
All this, and more endearing still than all,
Thy constant flow of love, that knew no fall,      65
Ne'er roughened by those cataracts and breaks,
That humour interposed too often makes;
All this still legible in Memory's page,
And still to be so to my latest age,
Adds joy to duty, makes me glad to pay             70
Such honours to thee as my numbers may;
Perhaps a frail memorial, but sincere,
Not scorned in Heaven, though little noticed here.
Could Time, his flight reversed, restore the hours
When, playing with thy vesture's tissued flowers,  75
The violet, the pink, and jessamine,
I pricked them into paper with a pin,
(And thou wast happier than myself the while,
Wouldst softly speak, and stroke my head and smile),
Could those few pleasant days again appear,        So
Might one wish bring them, would I wish them here?




202  ON RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE.
I would not trust my heart-the dear delight
Seems so to be desired, perhaps I might.I But no-what here we call our life is such,
So little to be loved, and thou so much,           85
That I should ill requite thee, to constrain
Thy unbound spirit into bonds again.
Thou, as a gallant bark from Albion's coast
(The storms all weathered and the ocean crossed)
Shoots into port at some well-havened isle,        go
Where spices breathe, and brighter seasons smile,
There sits quiescent on the floods that show
Her beauteous form reflected clear below,
While airs impregnated with incense play
Around her, fanning light her streamers gay;-      95
So thou, with sails how swift! hast reached the shore,
' Where tempests never beat nor billows roar;'
And thy loved consort on the dangerous tide
Of life, long since has anchored by thy side.
But me, scarce hoping to attain that rest,        0oo
Always from port withheld, always distressedMe howling blasts drive devious, tempest-tossed,
Sails ripped, seams opening wide, and compass lost,
And day by day some current's thwarting force
Sets me more distant from a prosperous course.    Io,
I Yet oh the thought, that thou art safe, and he!
That thought is joy, arrive what may to me.
My boast is not that I deduce my birth
From loins enthroned, and rulers of the earth;
But higher far my proud pretensions rise-          10
The son of parents passed into the skies.
And now, Farewell.-Time unrevoked has run
His wonted course, yet what I wished is done.
By Contemplation's help, not sought in vain,
I seem to have lived my childhood o'er again;     II5
To have renewed the joys that once were mine,
Without the sin of violating thine;
And while the wings of Fancy still are free,
And I can view this mimic show of thee,




THE yUDGMENT OF THE POETS.


203


Time has but half succeeded in his theft-         120
Thyself removed, thy power to soothe me left.
THE JUDGMENT OF THE POETS.
Two Nymphs, both nearly of an age,
Of numerous charms possessed,
A warm dispute once chanced to wage,
Whose temper was the best.
The worth of each had been complete,          5
Had both alike been mild:
But one, although her smile was sweet,
Frowned oftener than she smiled.
And in her humour, when she frowned,
Would raise her voice, and roar,           10
And shake with fury to the ground,
The garland that she wore.
The other was of gentler cast,
From all such frenzy clear,
Her frowns were seldom known to last,        I5
And never proved severe.
To poets of renown in song
The Nymphs referred the cause,
Who, strange to tell, all judged it wrong,
And gave misplaced applause.               20
They gentle called, and kind and soft,
The flippant and the scold,
And though she changed her mood so oft,
That failing left untold.
No judges, sure, were e'er so mad,           25
Or so resolved to errIn short, the charms her sister had
They lavished all on her.




204


YARDLEY OAK.


Then thus the god whom fondly they
Their great inspirer call,               30
Was heard, one genial summer's day,
To reprimand them all.
'Since thus ye have combined,' he said,
' My favourite Nymph to slight,
'Adorning May, that peevish maid,           35
'With June's undoubted right,
'The minx shall, for your folly's sake,
'Still prove herself a shrew,
'Shall make your scribbling fingers ache,
'And pinch your noses blue.'              40
YARDLEY OAK.
SURVIVOR sole, and hardly such, of all
That once lived here thy brethren! At my birth
(Since which I number threescore winters past),
A shattered veteran, hollow-trunked perhaps,
As now, and with excoriate forks deform,            5
Relics of ages! Could a mind, imbued
With truth from heaven, created thing adore,
I might with reverence kneel, and worship thee.
It seems idolatry with some excuse,
When our forefather Druids in their oaks           I0
Imagined sanctity. The conscience, yet
Unpurified by an authentic act
Of amnesty, the meed of blood divine,
Loved not the light, but, gloomy, into gloom
Of thickest shades, like Adam after taste          '5
Of fruit proscribed, as to a refuge, fled.
Thou wast a bauble once, a cup and ball
Which babes might play with; and the thievish jay,
Seeking her food, with ease might have purloined
The auburn nut that held thee, swallowing down     20




YARDLEY OAK.


205


Thy yet close-folded latitude of boughs,
And all thine embryo vastness, at a gulp.
But Fate thy growth decreed; autumnal rains
Beneath thy parent tree mellowed the soil
Designed thy cradle; and a skipping deer,          25
With pointed hoof dibbling the glebe, prepared
The soft receptacle, in which, secure,
Thy rudiments should sleep the winter through.
So Fancy dreams. Disprove it, if ye can,
Ye reasoners broad awake, whose busy search        30
Of argument, employed too oft amiss,
Sifts half the pleasures of short life away!
Thou fellest mature; and, in the loamy clod,
Swelling with vegetative force instinct,
Didst burst thine egg, as theirs the fabled twins,  35
Now stars; two lobes, protruding, paired exact;
A leaf succeeded, and another leaf,
And, all the elements thy puny growth
Fostering propitious, thou becamest a twig.
Who lived when thou wast such? Oh, couldst thou speak,
As in Dodona once thy kindred trees,               41
Oracular, I would not curious ask
The future, best unknown, but, at thy mouth
Inquisitive, the less ambiguous past.
By thee I might correct, erroneous oft,          45
The clock of history, facts and events
Timing more punctual, unrecorded facts
Recovering, and misstated setting rightDesperate attempt, till trees shall speak again!
Time made thee what thou wast, king of the woods; 50
And Time hath made thee what thou art-a cave
For owls to roost in. Once thy spreading boughs
O'erhung the champaign; and the numerous flock
That grazed it stood beneath that ample cope
Uncrowded, yet safe sheltered from the storm.      55
No flock frequents thee now. Thou hast outlived
Thy popularity, and art become
(Unless verse rescue thee awhile) a thing




206


6  YARDLEY OAK.


Forgotten, as the foliage of thy youth.
While thus through all the stages thou hast pushed  6o
Of treeship-first a seedling, hid in grass;
Then twig; then sapling; and, as century rolled
Slow after century, a giant bulk
Of girth enormous, with moss-cushioned root
Upheaved above the soil, and sides embossed        65
With prominent wens globose; till at the last
The rottenness, which time is charged to inflict
On other mighty ones, found also thee.
What exhibitions various hath the world
Witnessed, of mutability in all                    70
That we account most durable below!
Change is the diet on which all subsist,
Created changeable, and change at last
Destroys them-skies uncertain, now the heat
Transmitting cloudless, and the solar beam         75
Now quenching in a boundless sea of cloudsCalm and alternate storm, moisture, and drought,
Invigorate by turns the springs of life
In all that live, plant, animal, and man,
And in conclusion mar them. Nature's threads,      80
Fine passing thought, e'en in her coarsest works,
Delight in agitation, yet sustain
The force that agitates not unimpaired;
But worn by frequent impulse, to the cause
Of their best tone their dissolution owe.          85
Thought cannot spend itself, comparing still
The great and little of thy lot, thy growth
From almost nullity into a state
Of matchless grandeur, and declension thence,
Slow, into such magnificent decay.                 go
Time was when, settling on thy leaf, a fly
Could shake thee to the root-and time has been
When tempests could not. At thy firmest age
Thou hadst within thy bole solid contents
That might have ribbed the sides and planked the deck
Of some flagged admiral; and tortuous arms,        96




YARDLEY OAK.


207


The shipwright's darling treasure, didst present
To the four-quartered winds, robust and bold,
Warped into tough knee-timber, many a load!
But the axe spared thee. In those thriftier days  Ioo
Oaks fell not, hewn by thousands, to supply
The bottomless demands of contest waged
For senatorial honours. Thus to Time
The task was left to whittle thee away
With his sly scythe, whose ever-nibbling edge,    105
Noiseless, an atom, and an atom more,
Disjoining from the rest, has unobserved,
Achieved a labour which had, far and wide,
By man performed, made all the forest ring.
Embowelled now, and of thy ancient self        IM0
Possessing naught but the scooped rind that seems
A huge throat calling to the clouds for drink,
Which it would give in rivulets to thy root,
Thou temptest none, but rather much forbiddest
The feller's toil which thou couldst ill requite.  II5
Yet is thy root sincere, sound as the rock,
A quarry of stout spurs and knotted fangs,
Which, crooked into a thousand whimsies, clasp
The stubborn soil, and hold thee still erect.
So stands a kingdom, whose foundation yet       120
Fails not, in virtue and in wisdom laid,
Though all the superstructure, by the tooth
Pulverized of venality, a shell
Stands now, and semblance only of itself!
Thine arms have left thee. Winds have rent them off 125
Long since, and rovers of the forest wild
With bow and shaft have burnt them. Some have left
A splintered stump bleached to a snowy white;
And some memorial none where once they grew.
Yet Life still lingers in thee, and puts forth    I30
Proof not contemptible of what she can,
Even where Death predominates. The spring
Finds thee not less alive to her sweet force
Than yonder upstarts of the neighbouring wood,




208


THE RETIRED CAT.


So much thy juniors, who their birth received     135
Half a millennium since the date of thine.
But since, although well qualified by age
To teach, no Spirit dwells in thee, nor voice
May be expected from thee, seated here
On thy distorted root, with hearers none,         140
Or prompter, save the scene, I will perform
Myself the oracle, and will discourse
In my own ear such matter as I may.
One man alone, the father of us all,
Drew not his life from woman; never gazed,        145
With mute unconsciousness of what he saw,
On all around him; learned not by degrees,
Nor owed articulation to his ear;
But moulded by his Maker into man
At once, upstood intelligent, surveyed            150
All creatures, with precision understood
Their purport, uses, properties, resigned
To each his name significant, and filled
With love and wisdom, rendered back to Heaven
In praise harmonious the first air he drew.        55
He was excused the penalties of dull
Minority. No tutor charged his hand
With the thought-tracing quill, or tasked his mind
With problems. History, not wanted yet,
Leaned on her elbow, watching Time, whose course  160
Eventful, should supply her with a theme;..
THE RETIRED CAT.
A POETrS cat, sedate and grave
As poet well could wish to have,
Was much addicted to inquire
For nooks to which she might retire,
And where, secure as mouse in chink,        5
She might repose, or sit and think.




THE RETIRED CA T.


209


I know not where.she caught the trickNature perhaps herself had cast her
In such a mould philosophique,
Or else she learned it of her master.    To
Sometimes ascending, debonair,
An apple tree, or lofty pear,
Lodged with convenience in the fork,
She watched the gardener at his work;
Sometimes her ease and solace sought       15
In an old empty watering pot;
There, wanting nothing save a fan,
To seem some nymph in her sedan
Apparelled in exactest sort,
And ready to be borne to court.            20
But love of change, it seems, has place,
Not only in our wiser race;
Cats also feel, as well as we,
That passion's force, and so did she.
Her climbing, she began to find,           25
Exposed her too much to the wind,
And the old utensil of tin
Was cold and comfortless within:
She therefore wished instead of those
Some place of more serene repose,          30
Where neither cold might come, nor air
Too rudely wanton with her hair,
And sought it in the likeliest mode
Within her master's snug abode.
A drawer, it chanced, at bottom lined    35
With linen of the softest kind,
With such as merchants introduce
From India, for the ladies' use,
A drawer impending o'er the rest,
Half open in the topmost chest,            40
Of depth enough, and none to spare,
Invited her to slumber there;
Puss with delight beyond expression
Surveyed the scene, and took possession.


VOL. 1I.


r




g1o


THBE RETIRED CA T.


Recumbent at her ease, ere long,           45
And lulled by her own humdrum song,
She left the cares of life behind,
d And slept as she would sleep her last,
When in came, housewifely inclined,
The chambermaid, and shut it fast;       So
By no malignity impelled,
But all unconscious whom it held.
Awakened by the shock (cried Puss)
'Was ever cat attended thus?
'The open drawer was left, I see,          55
'Merely to prove a nest for me,
'For soon as I was well composed,
'Then came the maid, and it was closed,
'How smooth these 'kerchiefs, and how sweet!
'Oh what a delicate retreat!               6o
'I will resign myself to rest
'Till Sol, declining in the west,
'Shall call to supper, when, no doubt,
'Susan will come and let me out.'
The evening came, the sun descended,     65
And Puss remained still unattended.
The night rolled tardily away,
(With her indeed 'twas never day),
The sprightly morn her course renewed,
The evening gray again ensued,             70
And puss came into mind no more
Than if entombed the day before.
With hunger pinched, and pinched for room,
She now presaged approaching doom,
Nor slept a single wink, or purred,        75
Conscious of jeopardy incurred.
That night, by chance, the poet watching,
Heard an inexplicable scratching;
His noble heart went pit-a-pat,
And to himself he said-'What's that?'      so
He drew the curtain at his side,
And forth he peeped, but nothing spied.




THE RETIRED CAT.


211


tet, by his ear directed, guessed
Something imprisoned in the chest,
And, doubtful what, with prudent care      B5
Resolved it should continue there.
At length a voice which well he knew,
A long and melancholy mew,
Saluting his poetic ears,
'Consoled him and dispelled his fears:      90
He left his bed, he trod the floor,
He 'gan in haste the drawers explore,
The lowest first, and without stop
The rest in order to the top.
For 'tis a truth well known to most,       95
That whatsoever thing is lost,
We seek it, ere it come to light,
In every cranny but the right.
Forth skipped the cat, not now replete
As erst with airy self-conceit,           1oo
Nor in her own fond apprehension
A theme for all the world's attention
But modest, sober, cured of all
Her notions hyperbolical,
And wishing for a place of rest           l05
Anything rather than a chest.
Then stepped the poet into bed,
With this reflection in his head.
MORAL.
Beware of too sublime a sense
Of your own worth and consequence:        I10
The man who dreams himself so great
And his importance of such weight,
That all around, in all that's done,
Must move and act for him alone,
Will learn in school of tribulation        r 5
The folly of his expectation.


P 2




2X2     EPITAPH ON A TAME REDBREAST.
EPITAPH ON A FREE BUT TAME
REDBREAST,
A FAVOURITE OF MISS SALLY HURDIS.
THESE are not dewdrops, these are tears,
And tears by Sally shed,
For absent Robin, who she fears,
With too much cause, is dead.
One morn he came not to her hand             5
As he was wont to come,
And-, on her finger perched, to stand
Picking his breakfast-crumb.
Alarmed, she called him, and perplexed
She sought him, but in vain-              IO
That day he came not, nor the next,
Nor ever came again.
She therefore raised him here a tomb,
Though where he fell, or how,
None knows, so secret was his doom,         I5
Nor where he moulders now.
Had half a score of coxcombs died
In social Robin's stead,
Poor Sally's tears had soon been dried,
Or haply never shed.                      20
But Bob was neither rudely bold
Nor spiritlessly tame;
Nor was, like theirs, his bosom cold,
But always in a flame.




4 TALE.


2I3


TO MRS. UNWIN.
MARY! I want a lyre with other strings,
Such aid from Heaven as some have feigned they drew,
An eloquence scarce given to mortals, new,
And undebased by praise of meaner things,
That, ere through age or woe I shed my wings,        5
1 may record thy worth with honour due,
In verse as musical as thou art true,
Verse that immortalizes whom it sings!
But thou hast little need. There is a book
By seraphs writ with beams of heavenly light,        10
On which the eyes of God not rarely look,
A chronicle of actions just and bright;
There all thy deeds, my faithful Mary, shine,
And, since thou ownest that praise, I spare thee mine.
A TALE.
IN Scotland's realm, where trees are few,
Nor even shrubs abound,
But where, however bleak the view,
Some better things are found.
For husband there and wife may boast         5
Their union undefiled,
And false ones are as rare almost
As hedgerows in the wild.
In Scotland's realm, forlorn and bare,
This history chanced of late-             10
This history of a wedded pair,
A chaffinch and his mate.




214


A TALE.


The spring drew near, each felt a breast
With genial instinct filled;
They paired, and would have built a nest,  IS
But found not where to build.
The heaths uncovered and the moors
Except with snow and sleet,
Sea-beaten rocks and naked shores
Could yield them no retreat.             20
Long-time a breeding-place they sought,
Till both grew vexed and tired;
At length a ship arriving brought
The good so long desired.
A ship!-Could such a restless thing        25
Afford them place of rest?
Or was the merchant charged to bring
The homeless birds a nest?
Hush-silent hearers profit mostThis racer of the sea                    30
Proved kinder to them than the coast,
It served them with a tree.
But such a tree! 'twas shaven deal,
The tree they call a mast,
And had a hollow with a wheel              35
Through which the tackle passed.
Within that cavity aloft
Their roofless home they fixed,
Formed with materials neat and soft,
Bents, wool, and feathers mixed.         40
Four ivory eggs soon pave its floor
With russet specks bedightThe vessel weighs, forsakes the shore,
And lessens to the sight.




A TALE.


215


The mother-bird is gone to sea,            45
As she had changed her kind;
But goes the male? Far wiser, he
Is doubtless left behind.
No! Soon as from ashore he saw
The winged mansion move,                 50
He flew to reach it, by a law
Of never failing love.
Then, perching at his consort's side,
Was briskly borne along,
The billows and the blast defied,          55
And cheered her with a song.
The seaman, with sincere delight,
His feathered shipmates eyes,
Scarce less exulting in the sight,
Than when he tows a prize.               6o
For seamen much believe in signs,
And from a chance so new
Each some approaching good divines,
And may his hopes be true!
Hail, honoured land! a desert where        65
Not even birds can hide;
Yet parent of this loving pair
Whom nothing could divide.
And ye, who, rather than resign
Your matrimonial plan,                   70
Were not afraid to plough the brine,
In company with man.
For whose lean country much disdain
We English often show,
Yet from a richer nothing gain             75
But wantonness and woe.




2X6:


TO MARY.


Be it your fortune, year by year,
The same resource to prove,
And may ye, sometimes landing here,
Instruct us how to love!                 So
TO MARY.
THE twentieth year is well nigh past,
Since first our sky was overcast;
Ah would that this might be the last!
My Mary!
Thy spirits have a fainter flow,            5
I see thee daily weaker grow'Twas my distress that brought thee low,
My Mary!
Thy needles, once a shining store,
For my sake restless heretofore,           To
Now rust disused, and shine no more,
My Mary!
For though thou gladly wouldst fulfill
The same kind office for me still,
Thy sight now seconds not thy will,         15
My Mary!
But well thou playedst the housewife's part,
And all thy threads with magic art
Have wound themselves about this heart,
My Mary!             20
Thy indistinct expressions seem
Like language uttered in a dream;
Yet me,they charm, whate'er the theme,
My Mary!




TO MARY.                    217
Thy silver locks, once auburn bright,      25
Are still more lovely in my sight
Than golden beams of orient light,
My Mary!
For, could I view nor them nor thee,
What sight worth seeing could I see?       30
The sun would rise in vain for me,
My Mary!
Partakers of thy sad decline,
Thy hands their little force resign;
Yet gently pressed, press gently mine,     35
My Mary!
Such feebleness of limbs thou provest,
That now at every step thou movest
Upheld by two; yet still thou lovest,
My Mary!             40
And still to love, though pressed with ill,
In wintry age to feel no chill,
With me is to be lovely still,
My Mary!
But ah! by constant heed I know,
How oft the sadness that I show
Transforms thy smiles to looks of woe,
My Mary!
And should my future lot be cast
With much resemblance of the past,         50
Thy worn-out heart will break at last,
My Mary!




218


THE CASTAWAY.


THE CASTAWAY.
OBSCUREST night involved the sky,
The Atlantic billows roared,
When such a destined wretch as I,;
Washed headlong from on board,
Of friends, of hope, of all bereft3         5
His floating home for ever left.
No braver chief could Albion boast
Than he with whom he went,
Nor ever ship left Albion's coast
With warmer wishes sent.                 10
He loved them both, but both in vain,
Nor him beheld, nor her again.
Not long beneath the whelming brine,
Expert to swim, he lay;
Nor soon he felt his strength decline,      15
Or courage die away;
But waged with Death a lasting strife,
Supported by despair of life.
He shouted; nor his friends had failed
To check the vessel's course,            20
But so the furious blast prevailed,
That, pitiless perforce,
They left their outcast mate behind,
And scudded still before the wind.
Some succour yet they could afford;        25
And, such as storms allow,
The cask, the coop, the floated cord,
Delayed not to bestow:




THE CASTA WA Y.


219


But he, they knew, nor ship nor shore,
Whate'er they gave, should. visit more.     30
Nor, cruel as it seemed, could he
Their haste himself condemn,
Aware that flight, in such a sea,
Alone could rescue them:
Yet bitter felt it still to die             35
Deserted, and his friends so nigh.
He long survives, who lives an hour
In ocean, self-upheld:
And so long he, with unspent power,
His destiny repelled:                     40
And ever, as the minutes flew,
Entreated 'Help!' or cried-' Adieu!'
At length, his transient respite past,
His comrades, who before
Had heard his voice in every blast,          45
Could catch the sound no more:
For then, by toil subdued, he drank
The stifling wave, and then he sank.
No poet wept him; but the page
Of narrative sincere,                     50
That tells his name, his worth, his age,
Is wet with Anson's tear:
And tears by bards or heroes shed
Alike immortalize the dead.
I therefore purpose not, or dream,          55
Descanting on his fate,
To give the melancholy theme
A more enduring date:
But misery still delights to trace
Its semblance in another's case.            6o




220               THE  CASTA WAY.
No voice divine the storm allayed,
No light propitious shone:
When, snatched from all effectual aid,
We perished, each alone:
But I beneath a rougher sea,               65
And whelmed in deeper gulfs than he.




NOTES.
THE TASK.
Begun in June or July 1783; finished in August or September 1784. It
was offered to J. Johnson for publication in October 1784, but not published
till July I785. Both the subject and the metre were suggested by Lady
Austen: see Life, p. xxix. 'If the work cannot boast a regular plan, (in
which respect, however, I do not think it altogether indefensible,) it may yet
boast, that the reflections are naturally suggested always by the preceding
passage, and that except the fifth book, which is rather of a political aspect,
the whole has one tendency-to discountenance the modern enthusiasm
after a London life, and to recommend rural ease and leisure as friendly
to the cause of piety and virtue.'-Cowper to Unwin, Oct. 1784 (S. iii.
I39*). ' It does not appear to me,' wrote Cowper to Newton, Dec. Ii,
1784, ' that because I performed more than my task, therefore The Task is
not a suitable title. A house would still be a house, though the builder of it
should make it ten times as big as he at first intended.'
Book I.-The Sofa.
Begun in June or July, and finished in the beginning of August 1783. In
vindication of the title, Cowper wrote to Newton, Dec. II, 1784, ' it seemed
almost necessary to accommodate the name to the incident that gave birth
to the poem... Had I set off with a design to write updn a gridiron, and
had I actually written near two hundred lines upon that utensil, as I have
upon the Sofa, the Gridiron should have been my title.'
1. I. Cp. the opening of Paradise Regained, and of the Faery Queene; all
three being imitations of the introductory verses prefixed to Virgil's Aeneid.
* The references are to volume and page of Southey's Works of William
Cowper, ed. Bohn (Standard Library), 1853-5, in eight volumes. Where the
Letters are quoted, the date alone is given; as they will be found in Southey
in their chronological order.




THE TASK. I.


1. 2. Truth, Hope, and Charity. See in vol. i. the three poems so named,
published by Cowper in 1782; and cp. Life, p. xxvi.
1. 4. adventurousflight. Cp. Par. Lost, i. 13:
' My adventurous song,
That with no middle flight intends to soar;'
and the same, Bk. iii. 13:
'Thee I revisit now with bolder wing,
Escaped the Stygian pool.'
1. 7. The Fair;-Lady Austen. See Life, p. xxix.
1. 9. Cp. Expostulation, 1. 486.
1. Io. 'As yet this world was not.'-Paradise Lost, v. 577.
1. 22. We have all seen pictures of Alfred the Great sitting on a threelegged stool. We are not however to conclude that the chair with four legs
did not exist in his days. For 'we find chairs of different forms in the
illuminations of Anglo-Saxon MSS., but they are always represented as the
seats of persons of high rank and dignity, and usually   of kings.'T. Wright's History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments, I862, pp. 41, 42;
where three examples are figured. These examples are all of them fourlegged chairs; and 'although very simple in form, are furnished with
cushions.' They were called sells, or stols (whence our ' stool').
1. 30. The word vermicular seems to mean no more than twisted spirally,
like a 'worm' (Latin vermis).  But Mr. Bell informs us, 'The species of
rustic work to which this term is technically applied is made to have
the appearance of having been eaten by worms, so that the stage of improvement in the construction of stools here described, is represented as having
been an imitation of the actual work of destruction that had been wrought
on its three-legged predecessors.'-(Poems of Cowper, vol. ii. p. 188.)
1. 32. Observe the classical use (uncommon in English) of the verb 'to
induce,' meaning to overlay, as with a covering.  Cp. Virgil, Georgics,
i. 196:
'Deinde satis fluvium inducit rivosque sequentes;'
which Phillips has imitated in his poem on Cider:
'There are who, fondly studious of increase,
Rich foreign mould in their matured land
Induce laborious.'
II. 34-8. Cp. Bk. iv. I50-5.
1. 44. Restless;-here used with an active meaning, as 'affording no rest.'
So in Richard the Third, i. 2, the ' helpless balm' is the tear which brings
no help: and in Venus and Adonis, st. o01, the 'helpless berries' are the
' painted grapes,' which afford no relief to the hungry birds.
1. 54. Crewel;-fine worsted, chiefly used for working and embroidery.
Beaumont and Fletcher speak of ' a skein of crimson crewel,' used as a hatband (Noble Gent., v. I), and Izaak Walton bids the angler 'take silk




THE SOFA.


223


or crewel, and make these fast at the bent of the hook.' In Shirley's comedy
of The Bird in a Cage, I633 (Dodsley's Old Plays, viii. 270), we read of the
'silk and crewel gentlemen in the hangings;' viz. the tapestried figures
'in the arras.' The custom of wearing garters of crewel is often punningly
alluded to by our old dramatists. Thus in King Lear, ii. 4, the Fool
exclaims, 'Ha, ha! lookl he wears cruel garters:' and Ben Jonson has,
in The Alchemist, i. 2:
'Ere we contribute a new crewell garter
To his most worsted worship.'
The crewel mentioned by Cowper was twisted up into knots or tufts on
the stuffed seats and backs of armchairs, instead of the buttons now more
commonly used.
1. 55. From Par. Lost, ii. 666:
'The other shape,
If shape it might be call'd, that shape had none.'
1. 59. Cp. Congreve's Mourning Bride, ii. 3 (ed. 1728);
'Its arch'd and ponderous roof,
By its own weight made steadfast and unmoveable.'
1. 78. The ' Two Kings of Brentford' are characters in The Rehearsal;
a farce written by Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, with assistance from
Butler, Sprat, and others, as a satire on the rhyming tragedies of the day:
London, I672, 4to. In Act i. (p. 6) Bayes explains,' The chief hindge of
this Play is, that I suppose two Kings to be of one place: as, for example, at
Brentforde... the people having the same relations to 'em both, the same
affections, the same duty, the same obedience... these Kings concern'd
in a reciprocal regard, as well to their own interest, as the good of the
people.' In Act ii. Sc. 2, the stage direction is, ' Enter the two Kings, hand
in hand;' and here it seems to have been a traditionary piece of acting, that
they should be also ' smelling at one rose.' In Act iii. T, when asked, 'But
why two Kings of the same place?' Bayes replies,' Why? because it is new,
and that's it I aim at. I despise your Yohnson and Beaumont, that borrow'd
all they writ from nature. I am for fetching it purely out of my own fancie,
I.' This farce was aimed chiefly against Dryden; and Villiers himself is
said to have drilled Lacey (who acted Bayes) to mimic the manner of the
Laureate, who long retained the nickname of Bayes. The popularity of this
play was such, that not only the Two Kings, but Bayes himself, and Drawcansir, became proverbial names. We happen to know that Cowper was
familiar with The Rehearsal; for he quotes it by name in more than one of
his letters (e. g. To Unwin, S. iii. 344).
11. 89-I02. For replicatory verses of this kind, cp. Par. Lost, iv. 641 -56; x. o086-104; Comus, 11. 221-4; and As You Like It, ii. 7:
Orl. If ever you have look'd on better days,
If ever been where bells have knell'd to church,' &c.




224


THE TASK. I.


'Duke. True is it that we have seen better days,
And have with holy bell been knell'd to church;' &c.
11. 90-7. Cp. Elizabeth Barrett Browning: A Night Watch by the Sea:
'The nurse that came for hire nods beside the sick man's fire,
Whose eyes grow dark and lose her;
Nods the nurse to every tone, little thinking how upon
Her charge, the death is winning,While the sick man, dreamingly, takes the rushing of the sea
For Eternity beginning.'
1. 95. Cp. Tennyson's Northern Farmer, st. 5:
'An' I hallus coom'd to's choorch afoor moy Sally wuir dead,
An' 'eard 'um a bummin' awaay loike a buzzard-clock ower my 'ead.'
1. I31. Cp. Bk. vi. 995; Horace, Lib. ii. Epist. 2, 55:
'Singula de nobis anni praedantur euntes;'
Pope, Imit. of Horace, Epist. ii. 2, 72:
'Years following years steal something every day;'
and Young's Love of Fame, Satire v. (apud S. vi. 6);
'Not numerous are our joys when life is new,
And yearly some are failing of the few.'
1. I45. This graceful record of affection for Mrs. Unwin was probably
added in a revisal, between 1783 (when The Task was commenced) and
1785 (when it was published). Cowper first met Mary Unwin a few weeks
after he settled at Huntingdon, June 22, 1765. See Life, p. xix.
1. I54. Here follows an exact description of a walk across the fields from
Olney to Weston. There is a gradual ascent to the ' eminence,'-a hill on
the grounds of Weston House overlooking the Ouse, and known as ' The
Cliff.'
L. 157. Cp. Wordsworth, Daffodils:'They flash upon that inward eye,
Which is the bliss of solitude.'
1. I62. Cp. King Lear, iv. 6:
'And yon tall anchoring bark,
Diminish'd to her cock; her cock, a buoy
Almost too small for sight.'
1. 167. Here is an error. The ' elms' should be 'poplars.' The editor of
Cowper Illustrated (Lond. 1803, p. 45), says, ' We have received a communication from Mr. Courtenay, who observes, that Cowper wrote the
passage which refers to these trees, under the influence of a mistake, and he
had often told him of the circumstance.'
1. 173. square tower;-of the Church of Clifton Reynes, one mile to the
east of Olney.
1. 174. tall spire;-of Olney Church. Bells;-cp. Bk. vi. 6-I2.
1. 176. villages;-namely, Steventon and Emberton.




THE SOFA.


225


1. 178. Cp. Hor. Ars. Poet., 365:
'Haec placuit semel, haec decies repetita placebit.'
Cowper wrote to Lady Hesketh, May I, I786: 'Weston, which is our
pleasantest retreat of all, is a mile off.  Mrs. Unwin and I have for many
years walked thither every day in the year, when the weather would permit.'
And to Unwin, Aug. 1, 1784: 'Your mother and I continue to visit Weston
daily, and find in those agreeable bowers such amusement as leaves us
but little room to regret that we can go no further.'
1. i83. Cp. Wordsworth's Excursion, Bk. iv. 29:
'Sustain, Thou only canst, the sick of heart,
Restore their languid spirits, and recall
Their lost affections unto Thee and Thine.'
1. I88. Cp. Longfellow's Voices of the Night, Prelude:
'Beneath some patriarchal tree
I lay upon the ground;
His hoary arms uplifted he,
And all the broad leaves over me
Clapp'd their little hands in glee,
With pne continuous sound.'
1. I96. Cp. Wordsworth's Excursion, Bk. iii. 984:
'That, by their onward lapse
Betray to sight the motion of the stream,
Else imperceptible.'
1. o00. Cp. Par. Lost, iv. 60I:
' Those to their nests
Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale;
She all night long her amorous descant sung.'
And the same, Bk. vii. 433:
'From branch to branch the smaller birds with song
Solaced the woods, and spread their painted wings
Till even, nor then the solemn nightingale
Ceased warbling, but all night tuned her soft lays.'
1. 202. See Richard Crashaw's exquisite poem, Music's Duel, describing the
contest between a nightingale and ' a sweet lute's master '; and cp. John Fo
treatment of the same theme in The Lover's Melancholy ( 628), act i. sc. I.
1. 227. Peasant's nest;-now a farmstead; no longer thatched, but tiled;
with a well sunk, and the surrounding trees cleared.
1. 235. Cp. Bacon, ' Silence is the rest of the soul, and refreshes invention
Thomson's Seasons, Summer, 11. 522-37:
'These are the haunts of Meditation,' &c.
Pope's Imit. of Horace, Bk. ii. Epist. 2, nIo:
'Alas! to grottos and to groves we run,
To ease and silence, every Muse's son.'


VOL. II.


Q




226


THE TASK. I.


1. 252. By the Colonade is meant an avenue of fine chestnut trees,
leading up to the Rustic Bridge.
1. 260. The word umbrella (a 'little shade'-dimin.; from Latin umbra)
as used here and in Bk. iv. 552, seems to denote a sun-shade or parasol.
Umbrellas have been used for this purpose in the East from time immemorial; and they are found carved on the bas-reliefs at Persepolis. But
the common use of them by men in this country, as a protection from rain,
dates from Cowper's own days. The old dictionaries of.Florio, Phillips, and
Bailey show us that the ' umbrella '-otherwise called ' umbrel,' or ' umbrello '
-was imported from Italy for the use of women, as a defence against
both sun and rain, in the seventeenth century, or even the latter part of the
sixteenth. Swift's Description of a City Shower, in The Tatler, No. 238
(Oct. 1710), informs us that even
'The tuck'd-up sempstress walks with halting strides,
While streams run down her oil'd umbrella's sides;'
but that its use was still confined to women appears from Gay's Trivia
(1712), Bk. i. 217:
'Britain in winter only knows its aid,
To guard from chilly showers the walking maid.'
Jonas Hanway, the philanthropic founder of the Magdalen Hospital (born
I712, died I786) is said to have been the first man who carried an umbrella
for rain, in the streets of London. He was a Russia merchant, and published
an account of his Travels in Persia in 1753; and it was probably about this
date that he introduced this adaptation of the Oriental custom to our
climate. Horace Walpole, describing the punishment of Dr. Shebbeare for libel,
Dec. 5, 1758, says,' The man stood in the pillory, having a footman holding
an umbrella to keep off the rain.' (Meraoirs of the Reign of George II, iii. I53).
This umbrella was specially noticed by Mr. Justice Dennison, in the judgment
which he pronounced against Arthur Beardmore, the Under-Sheriff, of Middlesex, for contempt of court in remitting a part of the Doctor's sentence.
The first umbrella seen in Bristol was red, and came from Leghorn in 178o
(Notes and Queries, ist ser., ii. 491); and the first in Glasgow was brought
from Paris by Dr. Jamieson in 1782 (Ibid. I. ii. 25).
1. 262. Benevolus;-' John Courtenay Throckmorton, Esq., of Weston
Underwood '-C. He succeeded his grandfather Sir Robert, as fifth Baronet
of Coughton Court, co. Warwick, in 179I; and dying without issue in
1819, was succeeded by his brother Sir George, sixth Baronet, 'You say
well, that in Mr. Throckmorton we have a peerless neighbour; we have so.
In point of information upon all important subjects, in respect too of
expression and address, and in short, everything that enters into the idea
of a gentleman, I have not found his equal.'-To Lady Hesketh, Dec. 4,
1787. Weston came to this family through the marriage of Thomas
Throckmorton, High Sheriff of Warwick and Leicester in 5 Edw. IV.,
with Margaret, daughter and coheir of Sir Robert Olney of Weston, Knight.




THE SOFA.


227


1. 267. The Bridge spanned a brook, which, after winding through the
park, crossed the road leading from Olney to Northampton, at a place called
Overs-Bridge.
1. 268. Cp. Hamlet, iv. 7:
'There is a willow grows ascant the brook,' &c.
1. 278. Ascending from the Rustic Bridge, along the northern boundary
of the park, a walk 'under oaks and elms' through which is seen 'the
embattled tower' of Emberton Church (see Bk. vi. 57-82), leads up to the
Alcove. This was a covered seat or summer-house, which crowned the
summit. It had six sides or compartments, of which three were left open
for the purpose of viewing the surrounding scenery.
1. 283. Cp. Gray's Elegy, 1. 81:
'Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply.'
1. 289. By a ' speculative height' Cowper seems to mean one from which
the spectator commands an extensive view;-such a height as that described
by Virgil, Aen. i. I8o:
'Aeneas scopulum interea conscendit, et omnem
Prospectum late pelago petit.'
This meaning of the word is not precisely recognised in our dictionaries;
though they commonly define it as' belonging to speculation,' whether in its
literal sense of' observation by the sight,' or in its (now more common) metaphorical one of' examination by the mind.' Othello (Act i. 3) speaks of the
liability of his 'speculative and active instruments' to be'sealed with wanton
dulness.' The commentators take these words to mean his eyes and limbs, as
the instruments of speculation and action. Hooke in his History of the Royal
SocRty, iv. 30, applies the term 'speculative glasses' to telescopes.
1. 313. Lord of the Wood. Cp. Spenser's Fairy Queene, I. i. 8:
'The builder oake, sole king of forrests all.'
1. 316. dewy eve;-from Par. Lost, i. 742:
'From morn
To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve.'
1. 320. the woods in scarlet honours. Cp. Hor. Epod. xi. 6:
' December... sylvis honorem decutit.'
And Virgil, Georg. ii.:
'Frigidus et sylvis aquilo decussit honorem.'
1. 323. 'At Olney the Ouse changes its character, and its course becomes
so winding that the distance from that place to St. Nest's, which is about
twenty miles by land is about seventy by the stream.'-S. i. 140; where
Southey proceeds to quote from Drayton: (Polyolbion Song 22).
'Ouse having Oulney past, as she were waxed mad
From her first stayder course immediately doth gad,
And in meandered gyres doth whirl herself about,
That, this way, here and there, back, forward, in and out;
Q 2




228


THE TASK. 1.


And like a wanton girl, oft doubling in her gait,
In labyrinth like turns and twinings intricate,
Through those rich fields doth run.'
1. 328. The Naiades were (in the Greek and Roman mythology) the
nymphs presiding over fountains, wells, and rivulets; and were generally
represented as lovely virgins leaning upon an urn, whence issued a stream of
water. They had their name from Gr. vdao, to flow. Between the 'short
and sharp declivity' leading down from the Alcove, and the ' reascent,' is a
narrow channel cut for the purpose of draining the hollow, and which is
generally dry in the summer. This the poet has personified as the Naiad or
Nymph of the Rill. Cp. Table Talk, 1. 693; and Keble's Christian Year,
Monday in Easter Week:
'Some sister nymph, beside her urn
Reclining night and day,
'Mid reeds and mountain fern.'
1. 331. the lord;-see note on 1. 262. When Mr. Throckmorton succeeded
to Weston Underwood in 1782, he allowed Cowper (though then personally
unknown to him) to retain the key of the park; to which he afterwards
added that of his private pleasure-grounds, and finally that of his valuable
library.
11. 332-4. Cp. Bk. iii. 719-24.
1. 342. Cp. Pope's Imit. of Cowley; ' The Garden,' 1. r3:
' Here aged trees cathedral walks compose.
Wordsworth; Labourers' Hymns:
'An altar is in each man's cot,
A church in every grove that spreads
Its living roof above our heads.'
'We have scenes at Weston worthy of description. One of them has been
much improved; I mean the lime walk. By the help of the axe and
the woodbill, which have of late been constantly employed in cutting out all
straggling branches that intercepted the arch, Mr. Throckmorton has now
defined it with such exactness, that no cathedral in the world can show one
of more magnificence and beauty.'-To Lady Hesketh, July 28, 1788.
Warburton writes in his Itinerarium Curiosum, p. 68 (apud S. vi. 13):
'The cloisters in this Cathedral [at Gloucester] are beautiful beyond
anything I ever saw... The idea of it is taken from a walk of trees,
whose branching heads are curiously imitated by the roof.'
1. 364. Cp. Shakspeare's 'primal eldest curse,' Hamlet iii. 3; and see
Genesis iii. 19.
1. 365. Cp. Par. Lost, x. 1053:
'On me the curse aslope
Glanced on the ground: with labour I must earn
My bread; what harm? idleness had been worse.'




THE' SOFA.


229


11. 367-71. Cp. Pascal, Pensees, xxv. 67: 'Notre nature est dans le
mouvement, le repos entier est la mort.'
11. 377-82. Yardley Oak. See the poem of that name, p. 204. Cp.
Virgil, Aeneid iv. 443:
' Consternunt terram concusso stipite frondes;
Ipsa haeret scopulis, et quantum vertice ad auras
Aetherias, tantum radice in Tartara tendit.'
11. 389-95. Cp. Table Talk, 1. 744; Task, i. 755; iv. 207; V. I81,
(where see note). Cp. too Pope's Dunciad, iv. 341:
'Thee too, my Paridel! she marked thee there,
Stretch'd on the rack of a too easy chair,
And heard thy everlasting yawn confess
The pains and penalties of idleness.'
Matthew Green, The Spleen, 1. 600:
'And pleasures fled to, to redress
The sad fatigue of idleness.'
And Young's Love of Fame, Satire, v. (S. vi. 15):
'With anxious care they labour to be glad:
What bodily fatigue is half so bad?'
11. 447-54. Cp. Truth, 11. 1-6; and Swift's description of a calenture, in
his South Sea Project, (Works, ed. Scott, vol. xiv. p. I48):
'So by a calenture misled,
The mariner with rapture sees,
On the smooth ocean's azure bed,
Enamell'd fields and verdant trees.
With eager haste he longs to rove
In that fantastic scene, and thinks
It must be some enchanted grove;
And in he leaps, and down he sinks.'
I. 455. The Spleen used to be regarded as the reservoir of all the peccant
humours of the body; and just as the liver was supposed to be the seat of
erotic passions, and the heart is still spoken of as that of the affections, so
' the spleen' came to mean anger, ill-humour, discontent, or melancholy.
' Spleen-wort, a fern of the genus Asplenium, was so named because it was
thought to be a sovereign remedy for affections of this nature. French
writers are fond of attributing ' le spleen' to the English as a nation.
1. 465. A pedlar's pack. Cp. Persius, Satire iv. 24:
'Sed, praecedenti spectatur mantica tergo.'
1. 493. Cp. Truth, 1. I76, and Spenser's Epitaph on Sir P. Sidney:
'And farewell merry hearts,
The gift of guiltless minds.'
1. 56. Cp. Par. Lost, ix. 247:
'But if much converse perhaps




3l30


THE TASK. I.


Thee satiate, to short absence I could yield;
For solitude sometimes is best society,
And short retirement urges sweet return.'
1. 524. 'Around his waist are forests braced:' Byron.
1. 527. goss;-the reading of ed. 1785 and I786.  Gorse (to which the
word was altered in 1787) is still pronounced goss in Norfolk. Shakspeare
has ' Tooth'd briers, sharp furzes, pricking goss, and thorns ' (Tempest, iv. r).
Deform;-(ed. 1785, I786). Milton uses this adjective, Par. Lost, ii. 706.
Altered to ' deform'd' in ed. 1787. (Cp. Yardley Oak, 1. 5, p. 204).
1.531. ' We have a scent in the fields about Olney which, even after
attentive examination, I have never been able to account for. It proceeds,
as far as I can find, neither from herb, nor tree, nor shrub: I suppose therefore that it is in the soil. It is exactly the scent of amber, when it has been
rubbed hard, only more potent. I have never observed it except in hot
weather, or in places where the sun shines powerfully, and from which the
air is excluded. I had a strong poetical desire to describe it, when I was
writing the Common scene in the Task, but feared lest the unfrequency of
such a singular property in the earth, should have tempted the reader to<
ascribe it to a fanciful nose at least [if not] to have suspected it for a deliberated
fiction.'-To Lady Hesketh, Dec. 6, 1785.
1. 556. After thanking Hill for ' two excellent prints,' Cowper writes
(May 24, 1788): 'I cannot say that poor Kate resembles much the
original, who was neither so young nor so handsome as the pencil has represented her.'
1. 569. the pedigree they claim;-viz. from Egypt. The English name
'Gypsy,' and the Hungarian ' Pharaoh-nepet' (Pharaoh's people), applied to
this race, testify to the popular (but erroneous) belief that they are of
Egyptian origin. They were proscribed by Stat. 22 Hen. VIII. c. io (1530)
as the 'outlandish people calling themselves Egyptians.' There is a legend
that they were expelled for having refused hospitality to Joseph and Mary,
with the infant Saviour, on the banks of the Nile; and it is stated that
when they first appeared in Europe, circ. 1418, they were led by one who
styled himself' Duke Michael of Little Egypt.' But in Egypt itself, where
they are numerous, they are regarded as strangers quite as much as in
Europe; and their language affords ample proof that they are in reality of
Indian origin. One of their names for themselves is Sinte, as coming from
Sind, i.e. India; and the Turks call them 'Tchingani,' from a tribe still
existing near the, mouth of the Indus (Tshin-calo, black Indians). They
much resemble the Nuls or Bazegurs, a wandering race in Hindustan, of very
low repute amongst the other Hindoos; and it is conjectured that they
belonged to the Soudras, a very low Indian caste, and were expelled by
Timour Beg, c. 1390. In February I856 Sir H. Rawlinson read before the
Royal Geographical Society of London a paper on the migrations of the




THE SOFA.


231


Gypsies; tracing them distinctly from the Indus, through Persia, Syria, and
Asia Minor, to the Bosphorus, whence they passed into Europe in the fourteenth century (see Athenaeum, 1856, p. 312). The earliest circumstantial
account of the Gypsies in England is 'The Art of Juggling or Legerdemaine, by S. R.' [Samuel Rid], Lond. I612, 4to.  This author states
that they arrived in England about the year 1512. (Notes and Queries,
1st ser. xi. 326).
I. 570. Palmistry, or fortune-telling from the inspection of the palms of
the hand, is very ancient; and under its Greek name of Chiromancy (Xep,
hand; and pavrTea, prophecy) is cited by Aristotle as a positive science.
Chiromancers divide the hand into several regions, each presided over by a
planet. The thumb belongs to Venus, the index to Jupiter, the middle finger
to Saturn, the annulary to the Sun, and the auricular to Mercury; the centre of the hand to Mars, and the remainder to the Moon. The ' line of life,'
which, when deeply defined, denotes a long life, and a short one if feeble or
superficial, is between the thumb and index, traversing the centre of the
palm. The triangle in the palm is consecrated to Mars; the longest
of the three lines that form it is 'the hepatic line,' proceeding from the liver,
and (if deeply cut) denotes a magnanimous character, but with a propensity
to anger and despondency. The' mediana,' forming the base of the triangle,
implies frankness, sprightliness, and love of pleasure. And so on, and so on.
('A World of Wonders,' 1853, p. 126).
11. 587-9I. Cp. Par. Lost, iii. 606:
'What wonder then, if fields and regions here
Breathe forth elixir pure?'
1. 598. obvious;-easily to be found; properly, that which meets one on
the way (from Lat. obviam). So in Par. Lost, viii. 504:
' Not obvious, not obtrusive, but retired.'
Cp. also, ibid. x. Io6; xi. 374.
11. 6oo-7. Cp. Bk. iv. 659-62.
1. 621. The Society and Friendly Isles. The former, a group of islands
lying near Otaheite, were discovered by Captain Cook on his first voyage, in
1768; and were so named by him in honour of the Royal Society of London,
under whose auspices he had sailed into the Pacific, for the purpose of making
observations of the transit of Venus across the sun's disk. The latter were
a group of more than 50o isles, forming an archipelago in the South Pacific.
They were discovered by Tasman in 1642, and were visited in 1767 by
Capt. Wallis, who called them 'Keppel Islands;' but were first fully explored in
1773 by Captain Cook, who gave them their present name on account of
the friendly disposition of the natives. The Sandwich Isles, so named from
the Earl of Sandwich, First Lord of the Admiralty, and otherwise called the
Hawai Archipelago, were discovered in 1778 by Captain Cook, who was
billed at Owhyhee (one of these islands) Feb. 14, 1779. Kameham6ha III,




THE TASK. Z.


king of the Sandwich Islands, became a Christian, and visited London in 1824,
His successor married Miss Emma Rooker in 1856, and she (as Queen) came
to England in I865 and was entertained at the British Court. Tahiti and
the Society Isles put themselves under the protection of France in 1842, and
are still a French possession.
1. 633. gentle savage; —Omai, a native of Otaheite, whom Capt. Cook
brought over as interpreter, on his return from his second voyage in 1775.
He became one of the 'lions' of London; was received at Court; was
painted by Reynolds; and was taken by Lord Mulgrave to dine at
Streatham with Dr. Johnson, who 'pas struck with the elegance of his
behaviour, and accounted for it thus:(Sir, he had passed his time while in
England only in the best company, soT that all that he had acquired of our
manners was genteel.') (Boswell, ed. I860, p. 497). Omai returned with
Capt. Cook on his third voyage, loaded with presents; and during the short
remainder of his days mourned over his exchange of the civilisation which
he had enjoyed in England, for the barbarism of his island home.
1. 644. Cowper here refers to the public gardens, such as Vauxhall, Marylebone, and Ranelagh. Of these, Vauxhall was at this date at the summit
of its fame, having been under the superintendence of Mr. John Tyers, the
friend of Dr. Johnson, from 1732 to 1786. It was then the favourite resort
of the aristocracy of London, including not only the Prince of Wales, but
the leaders of fashion amongst the titled ladies of the land. Jane Vaux,
widow of John Vaux, vintner, held the copyhold tenement in I6I5; but the
name is said to have been originally Fulke's Hall, being t]Je manor of Fulk
de Breaut6, a mercenary follower of King John. Pepys calls it Fox Hall
(e. g. Diary, May 29, I662, ed. 1854, i. 285). From the same passage we
learn that a part of it was called Spring Garden, because it had succeeded as
a place of public entertainment to the original ' Spring Gardens,' open in the
reigns ofJamesI.andCharles I. These were-situate between Charing Cross and
St. James' Park, and were so called from a water-work which, when stepped
upon, sprinkled the bystanders. During the Commonwealth the ' Mulberry
Gardens' (on the site of Buckingham Palace) filled up the interregnum
between Spring Gardens and Vauxhall, which was opened to the public soon
after the Restoration.
1. 673. ' The principal fruits of these circuits that have been made around
the world, seem likely to be the amusement of those who staid at home.
Discoveries have been made, but such discoveries as will hardly satisfy the
expense of such undertakings. Nations that live upon bread-fruit, and have
no mines to make them worthy of our acquaintance, will be but little visited
for the future. So much the better for them! their poverty is indeed their
mercy.'-To Newton, Oct. 6, I 783.
1. 681. Cp. Thomson's Seasons, Autumn, 1. I352:
' This is the life which those who fret in guilt,




THt SOFA.


233


And guilty cities never knew;. the life
Led by primeval ages, uncorrupt,
When angels dwelt, and God Himself, with man.'
11. 682-4. Cp. Juvenal's description of the foreign vices imported into
Rome, Satire iii. 62, sqq.:
'Jampridem Syrus in Tiberim defluxit Orontes,' etc.
And Dr. Johnson's London, 1. 94:
'London, the needy villain's general home,
The common sewer of Paris and of Rome,
With eager thirst, by folly or by fate,
Sucks in the dregs of each corrupted state.'
11. 687-728. Cp. Bk. iii. 833-42.
1. 700. Sir Joshua Reynolds (born 1723, died I792, Pres. R.A. 1768-91)
was compelled to give up painting four years after the publication of The
Task, owing to a failure of eyesight, 1789.
1. 702. John Bacon, R.A. (born I740, died I799) was a personal friend
of Mr. Newton and Cowper, whom he visited at Weston in 1788, and who
esteemed him as ' a most excellent man and a most agreeable companion.'
Bacon sent Cowper a print of his statue of Chatham in Westminster Abbey,
(begun in 1778, and not finished till 1783); on which the Poet wrote,
'I think the figure of Lord Chatham singularly graceful, and his countenance
full of the character that belongs to him. It speaks not only great ability
and consummate skill, but a tender and heartfelt interest in the welfare
of the charge committed to him.. But the figure of Commerce is indeed
a perfect beauty:-it is a literal truth that I felt the tears flush into my
eyes when I looked at her.. I have most of the monuments in the Abbey
by heart; but I recollect none that ever gave me so much pleasure.'-To
Newton, Oct. 22, 1783.
1. 703. Cp. Virgil, Aeneid, vi. 848:
'Excudent alii spirantia mollius aera:
Credo equidem, vivos ducent de marmore voltus.'
1. 725. Cp. Virgil, Aeneid, i. 46I:
'.. sunt hic etiam sua praemia laudi.'
1. 729. Cp. Philippians, iv. 8.
11. 732-8. Cp. Hamlet, iii. 3
'May one be pardon'd, and retain the offence?
In the corrupted currents of this world
Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice:
And oft 'tis seen, the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law.'
And Garth's Dispensary, Canto 2:
'Where little villains must submit to fate,
That great ones may enjoy the world in state.'




234


THE TASK. II.


1. 733. These ' rubricks of blood' (as Bacon calls them) continued to disgrace our statute books till i8Io, when Sir Samuel Romilly carried the repeal of 8 Eliz. c. 4, which had made ' stealing from the person' a capital
offence. In 18Ii, through Romilly's efforts, stealing in a dwelling-house
to the amount of forty shillings became no longer capital. His Bill for repealing the statute of William III, which made it capital to steal in a shop
to the amount of five shillings, was passed in the Commons in I8io, I8II,
I813, I816, and I818 (the year of Romilly's death), and was as often rejected by the Lords. Still, in I821 SirT. F. Buxton could say in the House
of Commons, ' Kill your father or a rabbit in a warren, the penalty is the
same! Destroy three kingdoms or a hop-bine, the penalty is the same!
Meet a gypsy on the high road,-keep company with him, or kill him, the
penalty is the same!'  (Memoirs, I848, p. io08.)  There were then 230
offences punishable with death. Mr. Peel, on taking office in i826, turned
his attention to the subject, and introduced a Bill upon it in i 830: and finally
the number of capital offences was reduced to eight or nine, and practically
limited to high treason, murder, and attempts to murder. During the first
twenty years of this century, the average number of persons executed in
England and Wales was 84. In the eight years, 1849-57, the annual average
was only nine.
1. 738. An allusion to Lord Clive's conquests in India. Cp. Bk. iv. 28 -30, 68I-3; Expostulation, 11. 364-75; and see Introduction, ~ 3, (vol. I, p.
lxiii).
1. 739. Cp. Hamlet, i. 2:
' It is not, nor it cannot come to, good.'
1. 740. Cp. Wordsworth's Excursion, Bk. ii. 258:
'An infidel contempt of holy writ
Stole by degrees upon his mind.'
1. 749. ' Nothing is more certain, than that when I wrote the line, ' God
made the country, and man made the town,' I had not the least recollection
of that very similar one which you quote from  Hawkins Browne.    It
convinces me that critics (and none more than Warton, in his notes on
Milton's Minor Poems) have often charged authors with borrowing what
they drew from their own fund.'-To Rose, May 20, i789. The line in
question is in ' The Fire-side, a Pastoral Soliloquy,' v. I6, in which Browne
says of country life, ' The town is man's world, but this is of God' (Poems,
ed. 1768, p. I25). Mr. Bell adduces a curious parallel from Varro, De Re
Rustica, iii. I.-' Nec mirum quod divina natura dedit agros, ars humana
aedificavit urbes.' Cowley has the line'God the first garden made, and the first city came.'
Bacon has also said, ' God Almighty first planted a garden' (Essay xlv).
1. 75i. Cp. the beautiful lines quoted by Mr. F. Storr (English School
Classics. Cowper's Task, i874, p. 76):




THE TIME-PIECE.


235


'She took the cup of life to drink,
Too bitter 'twas to drain;
Meekly she put it from. her lips,
And went to sleep again.'
1. 755. The sedan (now almost entirely disused in England) is commonly
said to have derived its name from the town of Sedan, in the north of
France; either because this kind of hand-litter was invented there, or because
originally covered with cloth manufactured there. But the Lat. sedes (a
seat) is a simpler, and appears to be a sufficient origin of the name: even as
Beckmann considers the most satisfactory derivation for the word 'coach' to
be the Hungarian gufsche, a couch (Hist. of Invent. ed. Bohn, 1846, i. 785).
Moreover, in one of our earliest notices of the sedan it is called a sedge.
Sandys, in his Travels, I6I5 (quoted by Fairholt in the Art Journal, May
1847, p. 159) says, 'The number of carosses is incredible that are kept in
this city [Naples], as of the sedges, not unlike to horse-litters, but carried by
men... Wherein those that will not foot it in the heat are borne (if they
please, unseen) about the city.' Haydn (Dict. of Dates, ed. I871) says that
sedans were first seen in England in 1581; but he cites no authority for
this early date. Prince Charles, on returning from his wooing of the Infanta
of Spain in 1623, brought from Madrid three sedans, two of which he gave
to Buckingham. When the latter used them in the streets of London, the
people 'with great clamour would rail on him as he rode, loathing that
men should be brought to as servile a condition as horses;' and complaining
of the king and nobles as thus ' degrading Englishmen into slaves and beasts
of burden.' In I634 Charles I. granted a patent for fourteen years to Sir
Saunders Duncombe for letting sedans on hire, as ' a proper substitute for
the coaches whereby the lives and limbs of His Majesty's subjects were
greatly endangered.' In 1636 appeared a curious tract entitled ' Coach and
Sedan pleasantly disputing for place and precedence, the Brewer's Cart being
Moderator.' The sedan is said to have been introduced into France by M.
de Montbrun in 1617, under the name of chaise a porteurs.
1. 771. Cp. note on Table Talk, 1. I93, and see Introduction, ~ 3 (vol. i.
pp. lx-lxii.) The expression 'graced with a sword' might indeed be referred to the fops of the period, who still wore the sword as an ornament at
their sides. But the closing lines of the poem evidently allude to the dismemberment of the Empire by the peace with America, in 1782, the year
before The Sofa was written.  Cp. Bk. ii. 225-32; iv. 25-7.
Book II.-The Time-Piece.
' The title appears to me to have a degree of propriety beyond the most
of theni. The book... is intended to strike the hour that gives notice
of approaching judgment, dealing pretty largely in the signs of the times.'
-To Newton, Dec. II, 1784.




236


THE TASK. Ir,


1. I. Jeremiah ix. 2.
1. 2. Cp. Thomson's Summer, 1. 652
'A boundless, deep immensity of shade.'
1. 8. Cp. Burns, Man was Made to Mourn:
'Man's inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn.'
1. 32. The foregoing lines were quoted with great effect in the House of
Commons by Sheridan, in a speech on the abolition of slavery, March,
1807.
1. 42. It was on June 22, 1772, that the great Lord Mansfield gave his
judicial decision, that ' slaves cannot breathe in England.' This was in the
case of Somerset, a slave turned adrift in England on account of declining
strength; and who, on restoration to health, resisted successfully, in the
Court of King's Bench, his former owner's claim upon his services.  In
1786, there were I30 English slave-ships, carrying 42,000 slaves. In May,
1787, the Society for the Suppression of the Slave-Trade was founded, with
Mr. Granville Sharp as chairman, and Thomas Clarkson and William
Wilberforce as conspicuous members. On May 9, I788, Wilberforce made
the first motion in the House on the subject.  In I806, Fox and Grenville
acceded to the measure; and on March 25, i807, an Act was passed for the
Abolition of the Slave Trade, from and after Jan. I, i808.  In I81i it
was made a felony to be engaged in this trade, and punishable with fourteen
years' transportation; and in I824 it was declared to be piracy, if committed
within the Admiralty jurisdiction, and punishable capitally (though this
penalty was afterwards commuted for transportation for life). On Aug. I,
I834, an Act was passed for the Abolition of Slavery itself in all British
Colonies; a sum of twenty millions sterling being voted as compensation
to the slave-owners. Finally, Aug. i, I838, was the day of the actual
emancipation of the slaves. See note on the Negro's Complaint; and cp.
'Charity,' 11. 137-95.
1. 53. 'Alluding to the late calamities in Jamaica.'-C. The island was
desolated by a succession of terrific hurricanes, at intervals, from Jan. I780
to 1786.
1. 54. Cp. Julius Caesar, iii. I
'Cry havoc! and let slip the dogs of war.'
1. 57. ' August I8, 1783.'-C. ' A singular meteor was seen to traverse
the sky from N.N.W. to S.S.E. It consisted of two brilliant balls of fire, of
the apparent diameter of about two feet, side by side, followed by a train of
eight others of smaller dimensions. The intervals between the balls (which
were not of a pure white colour, but delicately tinted with prismatic
hues), were filled up by a luminous substance of irregular shape, and the
whole was terminated by a blaze of light.'  Mason's Notes, quoted by
Mr. Storr, p. 80.




THE TIME.PIECE.


237


1. 62. Cp. Job ix. 6, and Julius Caesar, i. 3:
'Are not you moved, when all the sway of earth
Shakes, like a thing unfirm?'
1. 64. ' Alluding to the fog that covered both Europe and Asia during the
whole summer of I783.'-C. ' The fogs still continue, though till yesterday
the earth was as dry as intense heat could make it. The sun continues to
rise and set without his rays, and hardly shines at noon, even in a cloudless
sky. That such an atmosphere should obtain for so long a time... is
rather remarkable.. As a poet I claim, if any wonderful event should
follow, a right to apply all and every such post-prognostic to the purposes of
the tragic muse.'-To Newton, June 13, 1783.
II. 75-121. In the months of February and March, 1782, a series of
earthquakes took place in Calabria and Sicily, in the course of which more
than 20,000 persons in all are said to have perished. By the severest of the
shocks, which was on Feb. 5, the city of.Messina was utterly destroyed.
The aged prince of Scylla betook himself for safety to the sea, together with
many of his people; and the rest of them congregated on a high table-land.
These latter were destroyed by huge masses of rock, which were hurled
upon them from Mount Jaci; whilst the sea rose to an ' abnormal' height,
and the ' refluent wave' drove all the boats high up the shore.  This
calamity alone cost the prince his life, as well as some I500 or 2000 of his
subjects; the people left alive being (it is said) fewer than the corpses that
had to be buried.
1. 75. Cp. Par. Lost, xi. 653:
'Where cattle pastured late, now scatter'd lies
With carcases and arms th' ensanguined field,
Deserted.'
1. 78. Cp. Isaiah xxiv. 7, 8; and Thomson's Seasons, Summer, 1. IIo8:
' Mute the voice of joy,
And hush'd the clamour of the busy world;
Empty the streets, with uncouth verdure clad;
Into the worst of deserts sudden turn'd
The cheerful haunt of men.'
1. 85. Cp. Pope's Messiah, 11. 23-30:
'See! Nature hastes her earliest wreaths to bring,
With all the incense of the breathing spring...
Hark! a glad voice the lonely desert cheers:
"Prepare the way! a God, a God appears."'
1. 91. Cp. Jeremiah iv. 24; and Psalm cxliv. 5.
1. I02. vortiginous: i.e. like a 'vortex,' or whirlpool. The present
passage seems to be the only authority for this word, given in the
dictionaries.
11. o07-Io. ' Near Laurcana, in Calabria Ultra, a singular phenomenon




238


THE TASK. It.


had been produced: the surface of two whole tenements, with large olive and
mulberry trees therein, situated in a valley perfectly level, had been detached
by the earthquake and transplanted, the trees still remaining in their places,
to a distance of a mile from their former situation.' Sir W. Hamilton to Sir
Y. Banks, quoted by Mr. Storr, p. 8i. He adds, from Burton's General
History of Earthquakes, that in I57I, Marclay Hill, near Kinaston in
Herefordshire, was ' conveyed bodily to a considerable distance, trees, flocks,
and all.'
1. IIx. The word enormous is here used, apparently, in its older and
proper sense,-that of the modern ' abnormal.'
1. I14. Cp. St. Matthew viii. 27.
1. 121. Ancient towers.  Mr. Storr again quotes from Sir W. Hamilton's
letter: ' The superb palace called the Palazzata, which gave the port a
more magnificent appearance than any port in Europe can boast of, had been
entirely ruined.'
1. 50o. Cp. St. Luke xiii. 2-5.
1. 174. Cp. Bk. i. 712.
1. 176. Cp. Bacon, Advancement of Learning, Bk. i: ' In the entrance of
Philosophy, when the second causes, which are next unto the senses, do
offer themselves to the mind of man, if it dwell and stay there, it may
induce some oblivion of the highest cause; but when a man passeth on
farther, and seeth the dependence of causes and the works of Providence;
then, according to the allegory of the poets, he will easily believe that the
highest link of Nature's chair must needs be tied to the foot of Jupiter's
chair.' Bacon used nearly the same words again in Essay xvi.
I8I. Cp. Virgil, Aeneid, i. 8i:
' Cavum conversa cuspide montem
Impulit in latus; ac venti velut agmine facto
Qua data porta ruunt, et terras turbine perflant.'
1. 203. Cp. Hor. Epist. lib. i. I, 28:
' Non tamen idcirco contemnas lippus inungui.'
1. 206. Cp. Bk. iii. 837-40; v. 462-73.
1. 214. Ausonia;-a poetical name for Italy, as the land of the Ausones
or descendants of Auson, who was a son of Odysseus by the nymph Calypso.
Cp. Bk. iii. 582; v. 462-73; and Goldsmith's Traveller, 11. I11-22:
'Could Nature's beauty satisfy the breast,
The sons of Italy were surely blest,' &c.
11. 256-8. Cp. Par. Regained, iv. 467:
'Thence to the famous orators repair,
Those ancient, whose resistless eloquence
Wielded at will that fierce democraty,
Shook the Arsenal, and fulmined over Greece.'
This is imitated from Aristoph. Acharn. 1. 530:




THE TIME-PIECE.


239


'EvvEOev 6py?7 Ilfptc^El7s ov"Airtmos
ifarpairTEv, fp6, 3p6vra, Evv tca riv 'EAAXda.
Longinus also says that the eloquence of Demosthenes was as thunder and
lightning.
11. 225-32. See note on Table Talk, 1. I92.
1. 229. myrtle wreath;-in which the Romans appeared, 'all essenced o'er
with odours,' at their banquets. Cp. Horat. Carm. lib. i. 38:
'Simplici myrto nihil adlabores
Sedulus cura; neque te ministrum
Dedecet myrtus, neque me sub arta
Vite bibentem.'
And the same, lib. ii. I, 15:
'Canos odorati capillos,
Dum licet, Assyriaque nardo
Potamus uncti.'
1. 231. Cp. I Samuel v., and I Chron. xiii. 9.
1. 237. Cp. Wordsworth's Sonnets to Liberty, period I8o2:
'We must be free or die, who speak the tongue
That Shakspeare spake, the faith and morals hold
Which Milton held.'
1. 244. Wolfe was killed at the taking of Quebec, Sept. 13, I759. See
Introd. ~ 3 (vol. i. pp. xlix-li). Chatham died May 14, I778. See note
on Table Talk, 1. 342.
11. 245-8. Cp. Bk. iv. 794-7. ' His blood boiled at the degradation of
his country. Whatever lowered her among the nations of the earth, he felt'
as a personal outrage to himself. And the feeling was natural. He had
made her so great. He had been so proud of her, and she had been so
proud of him.'-Macaulay on the Earl of Chatham: Essays, ed. i854,
vol. ii. p. 406.
1. 265. By 'the jewel' the poet means the North American Colonies,
which France 'picked out of England's crown,' by her alliance with them in
I778. See Introd. ~ 3 (vol. i. p. lix). To this interference of the French
on their behalf, Cowper constantly (however erroneously) ascribed the
success of the States in the assertion of their Independence of Great Britain.
1. 270. Cp. Young's Love of Fame, Sat. vii. (S. vi. 35):
'Who do for gold what Christians do for grace,
With open arms their enemies embrace.'
1. 281. Cp. Pope's Imit. of Horace, first Ep. of second book, 1. 143:
'Then peers grow proud in horsemanship t' excel,
Newmarket's glory rose, and Britain's fell.'
1. 285. Cp. Dryden's Spanish Fryer, ii. 2:
' There is a pleasure sure
In being mad, which none but madmen know.




240


THE TASK. II.


1. a86. Cp. Bk. iii. 559.
11. 290-3. Cp. Pope's Essay on Grit., ii. 297:
'True wit is nature to advantage dress'd;
What oft was thought, but ne'er so well express'd;
Something whose truth convinced at sight we find,
That gives us back the image of our mind.'
11. 294-7. Cp. Pope's Essay on Grit., ii. 243-52:
'In wit, as nature, what affects our hearts
Is not the exactness of peculiar parts;
'Tis not a lip, or eye, we beauty call,
But the joint force and full result of all.'
11. 298-304. 'Poetry, above all things, is useful to me in this respect.
While I am held in pursuit of pretty images, or a pretty way of expressing them, I forget everything that is irksome, and, like a boy that
plays truant, determine to avail myself of the present opportunity to be
amused, and to put by the disagreeable recollection that I must, after all, go
home and be whipt again.'-To Newton, Dec. 2I, 1780.
11. 305-9. We all need to be reminded of Quintilian's maxim: 'Modeste
tamen et circumspecto judicio de tantis viris pronuntiandum est, ne (quod
plerisque accidit) damnent quod non intelligunt.'  Cp. Bacon, Adv. of
Learning, Bk. ii. 19, ~ I (p. 182, C. P. S., 1873): ' These critics have
often presumed that that which they understand not is false set down.'
Pliny remarks, 'De pictore, sculptore, fictore, nisi artifex judicare nemo
potest.'
11. 3Io0-3. Cp. Young's Second Epist. to Pope (S. vi. 36):
'Serious should be an author's final views;
Who write for pure amusement ne'er amuse.'
1. 3I5. Yet what can satire? that is, of what efficacy or power is satire?
The word ' can' (closely connected with the verb ' to ken,' and the noun
'cunning') is here used in something of its original signification; namely,
to have the knowledge or skill for' a thing, to ' know how to do it,' Cp,
Hamlet, iv. 7:
'I have seen myself and served against the French;
And they can well on horseback;'
i. e. they have good skill in horsemanship. King Lear, iv. 4:
'What can man's wisdom
In the restoring his bereaved sense?'
1. 318. The absurd practice of ladies wearing black patches-miscalled
'beauty spots '-on the face and forehead has, unhappily, been revived in
the present day. It should be known that this, like most of the monstrous
and unbecoming fashions by which women love to disfigure themselves, had
its origin in the necessity for concealing a glaring personal defect on the
cheek of a reigning belle at Court. In the time of Charles II, these patches




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24I


were fashioned into hearts, diamonds, crescents, and such like shapes.
Butler in his Hudibras, Part ii. (1664) canto i. 61I, speaks of the
' black patches that she wears,
Cut into suns, and moons, and stars.'
We are told that some went so far as to display on their faces a coath-andfour, or a ship in full sail, all cut out of what was named 'court plaister,'
from its use by the ladies of the Court. In the reign of Queen Anne, as
Addison tells us in the Spectator, No. 8I (June 2, I71I), a political use
was made of these patches; which were worn on the right or left side of
the face, to indicate Whig and Tory politics respectively. But the principal
reason for their adoption by the women was from a delusion that their
charms were thus heightened.  Thus in the Gray's Inn Journal, No. 8, we
find as part of the ' stock in trade of a coquette leaving off trade,'-' the
secret of putting on patches in an artful manner, with instructions how to
place them about the eye in such a manner as to give disdain, an amorous
languish, or a cunning glance.'
1. 322. Cp. Job xii. i-Io.
1. 336. support and ornament;-Cp. Horat. Carm. Lib. i. I, 2:
'   et praesidium et dulce decus meum.'
Ibid. Lib. ii. xvii. 4:
'Grande decus columenque rerum.'
Virgil, Aeneid, v. 262:
'Donat habere viro decus et tutamen in armis.'
1. 338. 'Ambassadors for Christ,' 2 Cor. v. 20.
11. 35I-7i. Dr. John Trusler, successively a doctor, clergyman, author,
and bookseller, was a wholesale compiler and abridger of other men's
writings. In particular he abridged, and printed in imitation of manuscript
for use in the pulpit, the sermons of eminent divines. He died in I82o,
at the age of 85. That the sermons in question long retained their
popularity, appears from the following advertisement in The Record for
Nov. II, 1852:-'Important to clergymen.-A few sets of Dr. Trusler's
facsimile manuscript sermons may still be procured at the low price of half
a guinea for the set of Ioo sermons.'
1. 353. The News was probably the nane of some newspaper of the day.
The advertisement of the homilistic quack is represented as finding its
fitting place between those of' two empirics,' or medical quacks.
1. 360. i. e. like music in score, in which the ' accent, tone, and emphasis'
are indicated by letters and marks.
1. 367. Cp. 2 Samuel i. 20.
1. 369. Droll, v. n.;-to jest. It is also used, as a v. act., meaning to
banter, or cajole.
1. 375. Cp. note on Bk. v. 650.
1. 394. Cp. Bk. vi. 62o.
VOL. II.                       R




242


THE TASK. II.


11. 414-8. ' Affectation of every sort is odious, especially in a minister; and
more especially an affectation that betrays him into expressions fit only for the
mouths of the illiterate. Truth indeed needs no ornament, neither does a
beautiful person; but to clothe it therefore in rags, when a decent habit was
at hand, would be esteemed preposterous and absurd.'-To Newton, May 5,
1783.
1. 436. This ' nasal twang,' which has now almost died out of the English
conventicle, was carried by the Pilgrim Fathers into the New World: where
it has remained as a sort of national peculiarity of their descendants, the
modern Americans. Most of the so-called ' Americanisms' in speech and
phrase have a similar English origin.
1. 446. Cp. Churchill's Rosciad, 1. 625:
'Sparks at his glass sat comfortably down,
To separate frown from smile, and smile from frown.'
1. 458. house of clay;-Cp. Job iv. I9.
1. 480. Cp. Young's Love of Fame, Sat. i. (S. vi. 40):
'The love of praise, howe'er conceal'd by art,
Reigns more or less and glows in every heart;
The proud to gain it toils on toils endure,
The modest shun it but to make it sure.'
1. 49I. Cp. Shakspeare's 'lean unwash'd artificer,' King John, iv. 2.
1. 5.  Cp. I Tim. vi. 20; Col. ii. 8.
1. 516. Cp. Bk. v. 876-8.
1. 530. Cp. Isaiah xxxv. 8.
1. 533. shades of Academus;-that is, the Academia, a public garden or
park near Athens, so named from Academus, who presented it to his
fellow-citizens as a place for gymnastics. In it were statues and fountains,
groves of olives and planetrees. Here Plato delivered his lectures to his
disciples; who were distinguished in consequence by the name of the
'Academic' sect of Philosophers. Hence our modern word 'academy,'
meaning a school, or place of instruction.
1. 536. Cp. Young, Satire i. (apud Bell, ii. 228).
'When churchmen Scripture for the Classics quit,
Polite apostates from God's grace to wit.'
I. 540. The moral essays droned out from our pulpits in Cowper's days
were drawn less from a Christian source, than from these Philosophers., ' In
their preaching, nineteen clergymen out of twenty carefully abstained from
dwelling upon Christian doctrines. Such topics exposed the preacher to the
charge of fanaticism. Even the calm and sober Crabbe, who certainly never
erred from excess of zeal, was stigmatized in those days by his brethren
as a Methodist, because he introduced into his sermons the motives of
future reward and punishment.   An orthodox clergyman (they said)
should be content to show his people the worldly advantage of good




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(conduct, and to leave heaven and hell to the ranters.'-Church Parties,
1854, p. 3.
1. 548. Cp. Romans xi. 13.
1. 565. Cp. Pope's 'goes down an unregarded thing,' Mor. Ess. Ep. ii. 252.
I. 579. lustrum;-a period of five years. The word properly meant a
purificatory sacrifice (being commonly derived from Gr. Xovrpov, purification; though perhaps it is rather from the root Xv.w). This was offered by
the Roman Censors at the conclusion of the census; and as this occurred
every five years, the name was transferred to that period of time.
11. 580-95. The Monitor of 'George's days' has since been called a
'back-board,' and is still used occasionally in girls' schools.
1. 596. L. Licinius Lucullus, a noble Roman (born B.c. lIO; Consul, B.c.
74; died B.c. 57), after having gained a triumph for his successful conduct of
the Mithridatic war, became notorious for his Asiatic luxury and profusion.
Horace (who is probably Cowper's authority) gives it as an on dit that
Lucullus, when asked if he could furnish Ioo chlamydes for use on the stage,
replied that he had 5000 of those ' habits' at home (Lib. i. Epist. vi. 40-5):
Plutarch says 200 (Vit. Luculli). For a further account of Lucullus, see
J. Reid's Academica of Cicero, 1874, p. lviii.
1. 600. With reference to this line, Cowper wrote to Unwin, Aug. 27,
1785, 'Upon solemn occasions, as in prayer or preaching, for instance, I
would be strictly correct; and upon stately ones-for instance, were I writing
an epic poem,-I would be so likewise; but not upon familiar occasions. God
who heareth prayer, is right. Hector who saw Patroclus, is right. And the
man that dresses me every day, is in my mind right also;-because the
contrary would give an air of stiffness and pedantry to an expression, that in
respect of the matter of it cannot be too negligently made up.' Notwithstanding this protest, our author felt himself compelled to yield to what was
becoming the usage of his day, and revert to the who and which of Elizabethan
days. Mr. Bruce's laborious and valuable collation shows us that 'who' was
substituted for 'that,' in all places where the latter had been used as a
relative with a personal antecedent, in the editions of 1787.  As early as
I71I, Steele had sent to the Spectator (No. 78) his 'humble Petition of
Who and Which;' wherein these complain, 'We are descended of ancient
families, and kept up our dignity and honour many years, till the jack-sprat
That supplanted us.' The fact is, they had first driven out 'that,' which
was originally the only relative, and which returned to favour in the latter
half of the seventeenth century-probably as conducing more to smoothness
of diction. See Mr. Abbott's Shakspearian Grammar, ~ 258, ed. 1871,
p. 175; and cp. note on ' The Rose,' vol. i.
1. 638. Cp. Pope's Moral Essays, Epist. ii. 235-40:
'At last, to follies youth could scarce defend
It grows their age's prudence to pretend;
R 2




244


THE TASK. I.


Ashamed to own they gave delight before,
Reduced to feign it when they give no more:
As hags hold Sabbaths, less for joy than spite,
So these their merry, miserable night.'
1. 646. Cp. Thomson's Seasons, Autumn, 1. 1238:
'What though the dome be wanting, whose proud gate
Each morning vomits out the sneaking crowd
Of flatterers false, and in their turn abused?'
1. 648. When the streets of London were dimly lit up with oil lamps, the
wealthier sort of persons used to be attended by servants carryingflambeaux,
or by hired 'linkboys' with links (or torches of pitch and tow), to light
them  on their way at night. In I Henry IV, iii. 3, Falstaff says, in
allusion to Bardolph's fiery nose, ' Thou hast saved me a thousand marks in
links and torches, walking with thee in the night, betwixt tavern and
tavern.' In ' London' (i738) Dr. Johnson writes, 1. 234:
'Afar they mark the flambeaux' bright approach
And shun the shining train, and golden coach.'
At the entrance door of many houses in what were formerly the fashionable
parts of London, may still be seen, attached to the iron railings, the posthorn-shaped extinguishers, in which these flambeaux were quenched after
use. Gas-lighting in London was first introduced in Golden Lane, I807;
was used in Pall Mall in 1809; and became general through the streets
from I814 to x820.
1. 652. hackney'd;-carried home in a hackney (or hired) coach, or
sedan-chair. It has been asserted that the 'hackney coach' was so named
from the parish of Hackney, near London, as being the place between
which and the City the first public coaches for hire plied (in I625). This
was not the fact, and the derivation was invented on the analogy of that of
the Frenchfiacre; which had its name from its first starting from the Hotel
St. Fiacre in Paris. The word hackney had been current in this country
both as subst. and adj. three centuries earlier. It is the Fr. haquenee,
which meant the ambling or pacing horse (cheval de louage, i.e. horse for
hire) used by the ordinary or peaceful traveller, as distinguished from the
destrier of the knight, and the coursier of his man-at-arms. So the sportsman's 'hack' (an abbreviation of hackney) is the roadster which he rides to
cover, in order to spare his hunter. Perhaps the earliest use of the word in
English literature is in the Romaunt of the Rose (so long-but now no
longer-ascribed to Chaucer), where we find a' hackney' opposed to a ' hors
of prise.' The word is common in our early inventories: e.g. in the 'Status
Domus' of Jarrow Monastery, anno I313, 'Item in stabulo sunt ij palefridi,
et j hakenay' (Surtees Soc. vol. xxix. p. II). Menage defines haquende as
equus gradarius; and Brachet derives it from Sp. hacanSa. May it be that
the word was after all onomatopoeic, intended to express the sound of




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245


a horse's neigh (cp. Lat. cachinnus)? If it be objected that all horses neigh,
and that a particular kind of horse cannot be distinguished by a mark
common to all; it may be replied, that this appears to have been the generic
name for the riding-horse, (and in early times horses were not used for
draught or agricultural purposes)-from  which the superior kinds Aere
distinguished by special appellations. From this subst. flowed naturally the
several meanings of 'hackney' when used as adj.: viz. ' hired,' 'common,'
or ' worn out, used up.' The horse let on hire was that which had an easy,
ambling pace-'the right butterwoman's pace to market'-as being less
fatiguing to the traveller, especially if not an habitual horseman. So Florio
tells us in his First Fruites (1578) that the hire is 'a shilling a day for
a horse that can amble, and is caparisoned' (Notes and Queries, 3rd ser., iii.
135). Hence the 'hackney,' or ambling nag, came to mean the 'horse
for hire;' and the 'hackney man,' who flourished amongst us at least as
early as 1396 (see Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. ii. 355), was he who let
out horses on hire, preceding by more than two centuries the 'hackneycoachman,' who first appeared in London in 1623 or 1625. It therefore
seenis more probable that the 'hackney coach' was a ' coach for hire,'
than one ' drawn by hackneys.'
1. 684. catchpole;-old name for a sergeant, or bailiff. Bacon speaks of
' Under-sheriffs and catch-poles' (Essay 53): and in Essay 56, of ' Catching
and poling clerks and ministers.'
1. 708. Cp. Par. Lost, viii. 288:
'Grace was in all her steps, heaven in her eye,
In every gesture dignity and love.'
1. 741. in truck;-that is, by way of barter or exchange. See note in
Vol. i. on Expostulation, 1. 374.
1. 774. oscitancy;-(Lat. oscitare, to open the mouth widely, gape),
yawning, sleepiness.
11. 780-96. The Rev. John Cowper, A.M., Fellow of Bene't Coll., and
Vicar of Foxton, Cambridgeshire, was born Nov. 13, 1737; and died at
Cambridge, March 20, I770. The Poet left a sketch of his character, with
an account of his last illness; which was published from his MSS. by Mr.
Newton in 1802, under the title of Adelphi. (See S. I. 152-64.) In this,
his brother writes of him, ' He was a man of a most candid and ingenuous
spirit; his temper remarkably sweet, and in his behaviour to me he had
always manifested an uncommon affection. He was critically skilled in the
Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages, was beginning to make himself master
of the Syriac, and he perfectly understood the French and Italian.' (S. i.
152). Cowper wrote to Hill, Nov. 14, 1772, 'I have been a considerable
loser in point of income by my brother's death:'-although a sum of ~350
came to him out of John's personal estate. (To Hill, Nov. 5, 1772.)
1. 785. 'Bene't College, Cambridge.'-C. ' When I first knew Cam



246


THE TASK. III.


bridge, I knew that Bene't had a character: it was my father's principal
inducement when he chose that college for my brother.'-To Unwin, Nov.
20, i784. This College, now known as Corpus Christi, has at the present
day ' a character' which would have formed a still stronger recommendation
of It to the Evangelical poet.
1. 786. 'Praised, wept, and honour'd by the Muse he loved.' (Pope's
Epit. on Craggs, 1. 6.)
11. 792-4. Cp. Wordsworth's Ode to Duty, 1. 9:
' There are who ask not if thine eye
Be on them; who, in love and truth,
Where no misgiving is, rely
Upon the genial sense of youth;
Glad heartsl without reproach or blot;
Who do thy work, and know it not.'
1. 803. the quiver, &c. Cp. Psalm cxxvii. 6, 7.
1. 825. Exodus viii. 2-14. 'I do not think that drinkers, gamesters,
fornicators, lewd talkers, and profane jesters-men, in short, of no principles
either religious or moral, (and such, we know, are the majority of those sent
out by our Universities)-can be dishonoured by a comparison with anything
on this side Erebus. I do not therefore repent of my frogs.'-To Unwin,
Nov. 20, I784. Let us thank God that things are better now!
Book III.-The Garden.
11. I-8. Cp. Par. Lost, ix. 445-53:
' As one who, long in populous city pent,' &c.
1. 26. the satiric thong. Cp. Horat. Sat., lib. I. iii. 119:
' Ne scutica dignum horribili sectere flagello.'
11. 28-30. Cp. Horat. Carm., lib. II. xi. 13:
'Cur non sub alta vel platano vel hac
Pinu jacentes sic temere,' etc.
1. 32. Nitrous air was one of the names by which Dr. Priestley (born
1733, died 1804) designated what is now called Oxygen gas,-then newly
discovered by him. Cp. Thomson's Seasons, Winter, 1. 693:
' And through the blue serene,
For sight too fine, th' ethereal nitre flies,
Killing infectious damps, and the spent air
Storing afresh with elemental life.'
11. 41-57. Cp. 11. 290-304, and 675-94.
1. 46. drops of bitter.  So Lucretius, De Rer. Nat. iv. I 26:
' Medio de fonte leporum
Surgit amari aliquid, quod in ipsis floribus angat.'




THE GARDEN.


247


1. 52. zoneless;-ungirt, and hence' loose, careless, wanton;' equivalent to
Lat. discincta-the zona being the girdle worn round the waist by all
respectable young women.
1. 73. unsmirched;-unsullied. Cp. Shakspeare's' chaste unsmirched brow,'
Hamlet iv. 5. To' smirch' is from Germ. schmieren, to smear, grease, daub.'
11. Ioo-4. Cp. Rochefoucauld, Reflex. Mor., No. 223: ' L'hypocrisie est
un homage que le vice rend h la vertu.'
11. Io8-I2. Cp. Hamlet, iii. 2:
'Why, let the strucken deer go weep.'
The Earl of Surrey, ' The Faithful Lover,' I. 2 1:
'Then as a stricken deer withdraws himself alone,
So do I seek some secret place where I may make my moan.
Sackville, Complaint of Buckingham (apud Bell, ii. 240):
'Like to the deer that, stricken with the dart,
Withdraws himself into some secret place,
And feeling green the wound about his heart,
Startles with pangs till he fall on the grass.'
1. 113. Cp. Genesis xlix. 23.
1. rI5. Cp. Virgil, Aen. xii. 403:
'Nequidquam trepidat, nequidqnam spicula dextra
Sollicitat, prensatque tenaci forcipe ferrum.'
It is a bold Latinism to use the word ' solicit' in this sense-namely, that of
gently stirring the darts, and working them from side to side, so as to loosen
their hold upon the flesh, and 'coax' them out.
11. 139-50. Cp. Queredo, Vision vii. (apud S. vi. 55);-' Then came Domitian, dragging in Suetonius. There is no greater pest, said he, than that
generation of scribbling rogues, the historians:-when they have vented the
humour and caprice of their own brains, that forsooth must be calledThe Life of such an Emperor ' And Rochefoucauld, Maxim 7: 'Great
actions, the lustre of which dazzles us, are by politicians represented as the
effects of deep designs; whereas they are commonly the effects of caprice
and passion.'
11. I55-66. Cp. Bk. vi. 198-210.
11. 167-9. Cp. Horat. Epist., lib. I. i. I07:
'Liber, honoratus, pulcher, rex denique regum;
Praecipue sanus, nisi quum pituita molesta est.'
11. 174-6. Cp. The Rape of Lucrece, st. 3:
' What win I if I gain the thing I seek?
A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy;
Who buys a minute's mirth to wail a week?
Or sells Eternity to get a toy?'
Young's Love of Fame (Bell, ii. 242):
'Methinks we need not our short being shun




248


TitE TASk.  tI.


And, thought to fly, contend to be undone
We need not buy our ruin with one crime,
And give Eternity to murder Time.'
1. I89. Cp. Matt. Green, The Spleen, 1. 15:
'Nor vainly buys what Gildon sellsPoetic buckets for dry wells.'
11. 196-205. Cp. Terent. Heautontim. Act i. I;
'Homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum puto.'
Richard the Second, iii. 2:
'I live with bread like you, feel want, taste grief,
Need friends.'
Merchant of Venice, iii. I: ' Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands,
organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food,
hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same
means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian
is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?
If you poison us, do we not die?'
1. 2 5. The parallax is the difference between the apparent position of a
heavenly body, and its true relation to the centre of the earth. Mrs. Somerville defines it as 'the angle under which the radius of the earth would
be seen, if viewed from the centre of that body.' Cowper's meaning is, 'I
have not the wit to determine (with your philosophers) the apparent
variation of that star from its true place in the abyss.'
1. 251. Castalia was a fountain on Mount Parnassus, sacred to Apollo and
the Muses; and whoso drank of its waters was inspired to know the things
to come. Cp. Young's Night Thoughts, v. Io6:
'Unseen thou lead'st me to delicious draughts
Of inspiration from a purer stream,
And fuller of the god, than that which burst
From famed Castalia.'
11. 252-60. Sir Isaac Newton, born I642, died 1727; John Milton, born
i6o8, died 1674; Sir Matthew Hale (Chief Baron of Exchequer, 166o;
Chief Justice of King's Bench, i67I-5), born 1609, died 1676.
1. 257. Themis, daughter of Ouranos and Gaia (Heaven and Earth), and
wife of Zeus, was Goddess of Justice; the first to whom mortals raised
temples; represented as holding a sword in one hand, and a pair of scales in
the other.
1. 261. Isaiah xl. 6, 7.
1. 263. Proverbs xxiii. 15.
1. 267. Cp. Ecclesiastes i. 3, 14.
1. 268. The Amaranth is an imaginary flower of the poets, that never
fades, (Gr. a, not; iapalvco, to wither). See Par. Lost, iii. 552-60. Cp.
Shirley's Contention of Ajax and Ulysses, sc. 3:




THE GARDEN.


149


Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet and blossom in the dust.'
Cp. too Cicero, De Senect. cap. I9: 'Sed mihi ne diuturnum quidemn
quidquam  videtur, in quo est aliquid extremum: quum enim id advenit,
tunc illud quod praeteriit effluxit; tantum remanet quod virtute et recte
factis consecutus sis.'
1. 270. St. John xviii. 38. Cowper's assertion that Christ 'deigned no
reply' to Pilate, is at least as questionable as that of Bacon (Essay i.):
'What is Truth said jesting Pilate; and would not stay for an answer.'
11. 290-304. Cp. Thomson, Autumn, 1. 1234:
'Oh! knew he but his happiness, of men
The happiest he, who, far from public rage,
Deep in the vale, with a choice few retired,
Drinks the pure pleasures of the rural life.'
And his Castle of Indolence, canto i., st. I6:
'The best of men have ever loved repose.'
11. 334-5I. The Poet's favourite hare 'Puss,' given to him in 1774. See
his 'Account of the Treatment of his Hares,' inserted in the Gentleman's
Magazine for June, 1784 (S. iv. 422). Puss died March 9, 1786, 'aged eleven
years eleven months,-of mere old age.'
1. 35I. Cowper had 'acquired considerable applause, as a child, in the
recital of Gay's popular Fable-" The Hare and many Friends."' (Hayley,
ed. I812, iv. 179.)
1. 36. Laborious ease;-Cp. Bk. i. 755, and Horace's ' strenua inertia,'Lib.
i. Epist. xi. 28.
1. 363. Cp. Lucret. De Rer. Nat. Lib. iii. 984:
'Vitaque mancupio nulli datur omnibus usu.'
1. 364. use;-that is, interest; in which sense both this, and the cognate
forms ' usury' and ' usance' were formerly employed. Cp. Owen Felltham's
Resolves (1628) No. 8I; 'Their nature leans to mutual requitals; and to
pay with numerous use the favours of a free affection.' So Jeremy Taylor in
his Holy Living: ' If it be good, thou hast received it from God, and then
thou art more obliged to pay duty and tribute, use and principal to Him.' And
South, in his Sermons: 'Most of the learned, heathen and Christian, assert
the taking of use to be unlawful.'
1. 400. lubbard;-another form of lubber, here used adjectivally for
sluggish.'  Milton has ' the lubbar fiend,' L'Allegro, 1. IIo.
1. 429. 'Miraturque novos fructus et non sua poma -Virgil.'- C.
(Georg. ii. 82:-for ' novos fructus' read novas frondes).
1. 452. The Culex (gnat) attributed to Virgil (born at Mantua): and the
Batrachomyomachia (battle of the frogs and mice) fathered on Homer.
1. 455. John Phillips of Ch. Ch. Oxford (born 1676, died I7o8), published in I 703, 'The Splendid Shilling,' a parody on the style of Milton.




250


THE TASK. III.


The earliest piece of Cowper's that has come down to us is a poem written
in his seventeenth year, in imitation of Phillips: viz. 'Verses written at
Bath, on finding the heel of a shoe, in 1748.'
1. 459. Observe very rare use of the verb 'presume' as a verb transitive
having a direct object. Cp. Cowper's similar use of the verb 'to intend,' in
1. 387 of this book.
1. 490. voluble;-(from Lat. volvere, to roll), here used in its proper
sense of 'rolling.'  Milton has 'volibil earth' (with accent on the
second syllable), Par. Lost, iv. 594, with the same meaning.
1. 495. The atmosphere of Boeotia was proverbially thick and foggy,
owing to the great number of lakes and rivers in that district. And the
dwellers in it were regarded as exceptionally lumpish, and lacking in
spirit and intelligence.
1. 506. Cp. Hamlet, v. 2:
'Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,
When our deep plots do fail.'
Garth's Dispensary, Canto iv:
'Into the right we err, and must confess,
To oversights we often owe success.'
1. 559. Cp. Bk. ii. 286.
1. 576. The Amomum here intended is perhaps the Myrtus pimenta, or
Jamaica pepper.
1. 579. Ficoides;-the Mesembryanthemum crystallinum, or Ice-plant.
I. 585. Caffreia was the older name for' Caffraria.' The latter reading
first appeared in the edition of 1798.
1. 597. Q. Roscius Gallus, the famous Roman actor, under whom Cicero
studied the art of delivery (born B.c. 129; died about B.c. 62). David
Garrick (born 1716, died I779), has often been called 'The British
Roscius.' He 'trod the stage' from 1741 to I776.
1. 664. Cp. Bk. vi. 928-3I; and Wordsworth's Excursion, Bk. i. 95
' Strongest minds
Are often those of whom the noisy world
Hears least.'
1. 665. the neighbour shrub;-a late instance of the adjectival use of the
word neighbour; for which 'neighbouring' is now substituted. Cp. 'Sodom
and Gomorrah and the neighbour cities,' Jer. xlix. I8; 1. 40: 'neighbour states,' Timon of Ath. iv. 3; Bacon, Essay xxix.
1. 687. Cp. Goldsmith's Deserted Village, 1. 1oI:
'Who quits a world where strong temptations try,
And, since 'tis hard to conquer, learns to fly.'
And Horat. Carm. Lib. IV. iv. 5i:
'quos opimus
Fallere et effugere est triumphus.'




THE GARDEN.


251


1. 71i. Cp. Young's Love of Fame, Sat. i. (S. vi. 71):
'On every thorn delightful wisdom grows,
In every rill a sweet instruction flows;
But some, untaught, ne'er hear the whispering rill,
In spite of sacred leisure, blockheads still.'
1. 714. King Ahasuerus: see Esther i. Io.
11. 719-24. Cp. Bk. i. 332-4.
1. 729. Cp. L'Allegro, 1. i17:
'Tower'd cities please us then,
And the busy hum of men,'
1. 738. Stygian... darkness;-that is, the darkness of Hell; the Styx
being the river which was fabled to flow nine times round the infernal
regions. Milton calls it, in Par. Lost, ii. 577,
' Abhorred Styx, the flood of deadly hate;'
thus deriving the word from Greek arTvye', ' to hate.'  The gods were said
to swear by the Styx
' That dreadful oath, which binds the Thunderer.'
For this oath was always held to be inviolable; as a draught of the Stygian
waters was supposed to be fatal even to gods.
In I853 an Act was passed to abate the smoke nuisance proceeding from
chimney shafts and steamers above London Bridge.  In I856 its provisions
were extended to steamers below the Bridge, and to potteries and glass factories, by a second Act which came into operation Jan. I, I858. By these
Acts, the 'metropolitan volcanoes' are compelled to consume their own smoke.
1. 766. Lancelot Brown, a famous landscape-gardener (born 17i5, died
1773). He was called 'Capability Brown,' from his favourite phrase about
'great capability of improvement.' He laid out the grounds and park at
Weston for Sir Robert Throckmorton, the grandfather of Cowper's ' Benevolus.'
II. 781-9. Cp. Young's Love of Fame, Sat. i. (S. vi. 73):
'The pile is finish'd; every toil is past,
And full perfection is arrived at last;
When lo! my Lord to some small corner runs,
And leaves state rooms to strangers and to duns.
The man who builds, and wants wherewith to pay,
Provides a home from which to run away.'
11. 795-800. We in this age can scarcely believe the extent to which
bribery was carried on in Cowper's days. No wonder that it was never
found expedient to state the manner in which the ' Secret Service Money '
was expended. In 1763, Henry Fox, 'the least scrupulous of all Sir Robert
Walpole's pupils,' was Paymaster of the Forces under the Earl of Bute; and
' on accepting the lead of the House of Commons, he had undertaken to
purchase a majority in favour of the Peace. A kind of mart for Members of




252


THE TASK. IV.


Parliament was opened by him at his own office. It is alleged that the lowest
bribe for a vote upon the Peace was a banknote of ~200, and that Mr. Martin,
the Secretary of the Treasury, afterwards acknowledged ~25,ooo to have
been thus expended in a single morning' (Stanhope, History of England, ed.
1858, vol. v. p. IO: cp. Macaulay, Essay on the Earl of Chatham, vol. ii.
p. 380, ed. 1854). In Bk. iv. 603-12, the Poet charges even the magistrates of his day,-and those for the most part clergymen,-with accepting
bribes. Cp. Young's Love of Fame, Sat. i. (S. vi. 73):
'When men grow great from their treasure spent,
And fly from bailiffs into Parliament.'
1. 802. The crape was for the masks used by the highwaymen; of whom
there were still many in Cowper's day.
11. 805-7. Cp. Horat. Carm. Lib. III. xxix. 55:
'Virtute me involve, probamque
Pauperiem sine dote quaero.'
1. 822. In The Spectator, No. 193 (Oct. II, 17II), is an amusing paper
on' the levees of great men.' The word was then by no means appropriated
to royal receptions.
II. 843-8. Cp. Genesis xviii. 23-33.
1. 845. Cp. St. Matthew v. I3.
Book IV.-The Winter Evening.
1. I. This wooden bridge is of a length ' wearisome,'-because it 'bestrides'
the whole valley between Olney and Emberton; and ' needful,'-on account
of the 'wintry flood,' which would otherwise render that valley often
impassable to the foot-passenger.
1. 12.  'And whistled as he went for want of thought.'
Dryden's Cymon and Iphig., 1. 85.
1. 40. Bishop Berkeley, in the 217th paragraph of his Siris (1747), says of
'the luminous spirit lodged and detained in the native balsam of pines
and firs,'-in other words, his favourite Tar-water,-that it is ' of a nature
so mild and benign, and proportional to the human constitution, as to warm
without heating, to cheer but not inebriate.' (Notes and' Queries, 2nd
Ser. i. 490). In this line Cowper is found setting at nought that rule of
modern English Grammar, which requires that whenever ' not' precedes the
verb which it qualifies, the auxiliary' do' should be used before it. Thus, in
prose at least, we should write, 'The cups that do not inebriate.' In transgressing this rule our Poet is in good, if somewhat old-fashioned company.
Shakspeare gives us abundant instances of this classical use of the negative
before the verb-as it is invariably placed in the Greek and Latin languages.
Take such examples as these: 'I not doubt,' Tempest, ii. I; 'whereof the
ewe not bites,' ibid. v.; ' it not belongs to you,' 2 Henry IV. iv. I: ' it




THE WINTER EVENING.                         253
not appears to me,' in the same Act and Scene; 'whose all not equals
Richard's moiety,' Richard the Third, i. 2; 'I beseech you that you not
delay,' Coriol. i. 6; ' that which not enriches him,' Othello, iii. 3. So Ben
Jonson, in his verses To the Memory of Shakspeare, 1. 52:
'Neat Terence, witty Plautus, now not please.'
The original Anglo-Saxon negative, ne or na, was invariably placed
before the verb, and nowhere else: as it is in French, and as it was
in Latin (as ne-que, ne-scio, ne-queo), and in Greek (as vrA.~Es which is
from v17- and 'XEOos, varTeZcv, which is vqr- and feOioo).  But formerly in
English, as still in French, the modal element was added after the verb; as
ne-pas (' not a step'); ne-point (' not a jot'); ne-jamais ('not ever'). In
English the modal has been combined with the pure negative, and
(in the case of not) the compound word thus formed either takes the
place of the modal after the verb, or if placed before the verb expects
the auxiliary ' do.' The old forms ne whit, ne ever, ne one, have become
' nought' and then ' not;' never;' and ' none.'  In O. E. the union of the
negative with the verb by crasis was common; as, nam, nart, nis (' am not,
art not, is not'); nast, nath (' hast not,'hath not'). ' Will he, nill he' (Lat.
nolens, volens) is 'whether he will or will not.'
1. 62. Cp. Thomson's Castle of Indolence, i. 54:
'When lo   push'd up to power, and crown'd their cares,
In comes another set and kicketh them down stairs.'
1. 73. cataracts of declamation. So Juvenal (Sat. x. 128) describes Demosthenes as one,
'Quem   mirabantur Athenae
Torrentem, et pleni moderantem frena theatri.'
11. 74-5. Cp. Pope's Moral Essays, Epist. ii. 1 12:
'Woman and fool are two hard things to hit;
For true no-meaning puzzles more than wit.'
1. 85. Ethereal journeys. The subject of Aerostation was exciting universal
attention about the date of Cowper's writing. The first ascent was made by
Joseph and Stephen Montgolfier, at Annonay, June 5, 1783. Their balloon
was filled with hot air from burning straw. The first who ascended in a
balloon inflated with hydrogen, were MM. Robert and Charles, on August 27
in the same year. The earliest aeronaut in England was Lunardi,who ascended
from Moorfields, September 15, 1784; and the aerial passage across the
Channel was performed from Dover, by Blanchard and Jefferies, Jan. 7, I 785.
1. 86. ' Doctor' Katterfelto was a notorious quack, who used to go about
attended by a black Morocco cat, and headed his advertisements with
the words, ' Wonders I Wonders! Wonders!'
11. 88-92. Cp. 11. 308-o0; and Truth, 1. 253 (where see note).
1. 103. 'Lupus homini homo, non homo, quum qualis sit non novit.'
Plaut. Asinaria, Act ii. sc. 4. Cowper of course only quotes.his old school




254


THE TASK. IV.


book: but query,-Is this the idea embodied in the old legends respecting
Lycanthropy; the were-wolf of the Germanic races, and the loup-garou of the
South of France? Cp. Howell's Epistolae Ho-Elianae, Bk. i. ~ vi. epist.
58 (dated I644): ' I must resent the desperate case of this Nation, who
seem to have fallen quite from the very faculty of reason, and to be possessed
with a pure Lycanthropy, with a wolvish kind of disposition to tear one
another in this manner; insomuch that if ever the old saying was verified,
Homo homini lupus, it is certainly now. I will conclude with this distich:
"They err, who write no Wolves in England range;
Here Men are all turn'd Wolves, O monstrous change!"'
Lycanthropy was the transformation of a man into a wolf; whether actually
by means of magic, or in imagination, through a kind of frenzy or monomania. The word is from the Greek AVKos a wolf, and &vOpooros, a man.
So were-wolf is from Ang.-Sax. were, a man; and of garou Brachet tells us,
in his Etymol. French Diet. (ed. Kitchin, 1873), that it is the Old French
garoul, from 'gerulphus' (as Raoul from ' Radulphus'), which is found in
Med. Lat.; and quotes Gervasius Tilberiensis thus:-' Vidimus frequenter in
Anglia per lunationes homines in lupos mutari; quod hominum    genus
Gerulphos Galli nominant, Angli vero were-vulf dicunt.' Gerulphus is of
Germ. origin, and answers to Swed. varulf (from var, a man; and uif, a
wolf). Pliny discredited the story: 'Homines in lupos verti, rursumque
restitui sibi, falsum.' But he adds, ' Ista vulgo infixa est fama in tantum, ut
in maledictis versipelles habeat;' and cites the Greek Euanthes as an
authority (Nat. Hist., lib. viii. cap. 22). Ovid gives a minute account of the
conversion of Lycaon, King of Arcadia, into a wolf, as a punishment from
Jupiter for the savage ferocity of his disposition (Metam. i. 209-39). In
Virgil's Eclog. viii. 95-8, Alphesibaeus refers such transformations to the
magical effects of ' herba' and 'Ponto lecta venena:'His ego saepe lupum fieri et se condere sylvis
Moerim... vidi.'
It was from a similar belief, that in a conference of theologians convened
by the Emperor Sigismund, transformation into were-wolves was pronounced
a crime, and any assertion to the contrary was accounted as heresy.
1. Io4. Cp. Milton's 'brazen throat of war,' Par. Lost, xi. 713: Virgil's
' ferrea vox,' Georg. ii. 44; and Homer's g6a X6Afcov AlaiKiao, Iliad,
xviii. 222; and Soph. XaAhro36ov 'Apj, Oed. Col. 1046.
11. 113-9. 'My imagination is so captivated upon these occasions, that I
seem to partake with the navigators in all the dangers they encountered.
I lose my anchor; my mainsail is rent into shreds; I kill a shark, and by
signs converse with a Patagonian; and all this without moving from the
fireside.' —To Newton, Oct. 6, 1783. Cp. Soame Jenyns (apud S. vi. 78):
'Sometimes in distant climes I stray,
By guides experienced taught the way;




THE WINTER EVENING.


255


The wonders of each region view,
From frozen Lapland to Peru;
Bound o'er rough seas and mountains bare,
Yet ne'er forsake my elbow chair.'
1. 120. Cp. Thomson's Seasons, Winter, 1. I:
' See! Winter comes, to rule the varied year.'
And the same, 1. 1024:
'Tis done stern Winter spreads his latest glooms,
And reigns tremendous o'er the conquer'd year.'
Again, 1. 43:
'And fierce Aquarius stains th' inverted year;'
Which is Horace's (Satir. Lib. i. 1, 36):
' Simul inversum contristat Aquarius annum.'
1. 130. the yet undawning east. Our dictionaries give us no other
authority for the use of the word ' undawning,' besides the present passage.
1l. 39-43. 'I see the winter approaching without much concern, thought
a passionate lover of fine weather and the pleasant scenes of summer; but(
the long evenings have their comforts too, and there is hardly to be foundj
upon the earth, I suppose, so snug a creature as an Englishman by his fireide in the winter.'-To Hill, Oct. 20, 1783.
1. 163. charming strife. Cp. the 'concordia discors' of Horace (Epist. i.
12, T9), Ovid (Met. i. 433), and Lucan (Phars. i. 98); and All's Well that
Ends Well, i.:
' His jarring concord, and his discord dulcet.'
John Ford, The Lover's Melancholy, i. I:
'Concord in discord, lines of differing method,
Meeting in one full centre of delight.'
I. 168. 'Plain living and high thinking are no more.'
Wordsworth.
1. 175. Cp. Thomson's Seasons, Winter, 1. 571:
'Thus in some deep retirement would I pass
The winter glooms, with friends of pliant soul,
Or blithe or solemn, as the theme inspired.'
1. i90. Sabine bard;-Horace (born at Venusia in Apulia, A.U.c. 688;
called ' Sabina' from his favourite Sabine farm), Sat. lib. ii. 6. 1. 65:
'O noctes caenaeque Deum.'
1. 221. Billiard-mast;-old form of the modern 'mace,' which latter was
first substituted for it in ed. I806.
11. 243-8. Cp. Milton's Addresses to Evening, Il Penseroso, 11. 31-8; Par.
Lost, iv. 598-609.
1. 244. Cp. Milton's Song on May Morning, 1. 9:
'Thus we salute thee with our early song,
And welcome thee, and wish thee long.'




256


THE TASK. IV.


1. 285. Cp. Bk. vi. io6. ' I can assert with the strictest truth that I not
only do not think with connexion, but that I frequently do not think at all.
I am much mistaken if I do not often catch myself napping in this way; for
when I ask myself what was the last idea (as the ushers at Westminster ask
an idle boy what was the last word), I am not able to answer, but, like the
boy in question, am obliged to stare and say nothing.'-To Newton,
Oct. 9, 784.
1. 329. Assimilate all objects;-that is, render them  all alike. This
absolute use of the verb 'to assimilate' is uncommon, and is apparently not
recognised in our dictionaries. Its proper use is relative;-the object, to
which something else is assimilated being expressed. We must therefore
suppose an ellipse; as if the Poet had written, 'Assimilate all objects to one
another.'
1. 335. thistly sorrow. Cp. Catull., 62, 72: 'Spinosas Erycina serens in
pectore curas.'
1. 402. Skillet;-A small kettle or boiler. Old Fr. escuellette, now ecuellette; dim. of ecuelle, a porringer. Cp. Othello, i. 3:
'Let housewives make a skillet of my helm.'
Dr. Johnson, in The Rambler, says of Lady Bartle: ' It is indeed the great
business of her life to watch the skillet on the fire, to see it simmer with the
due degree of heat, and to snatch it off at the moment of projection.'
1. 411. Cp. Hamlet, iii. I:
'The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes.'
1. 428. Mr. Robert Smith, created Lord Carrington in 1796 (born
1752; died 1838). ' Under the strictest injunctions of secresy, he sent forty
pounds, twenty at a time,' for the relief of the poor at Olney.-To Unwin,
Jan. 19,  783. 'I have paid one compliment... which is so justly due,
that I did not know how to withhold it, especially having so fair an occasion,. to Mr. Smith. It is, however, so managed, that nobody but himself
can make the application.'-To Unwin, Oct. IO, 1784.
1. 437. To plash (Fr.plisser, from late Lat. plictiare, a derivative ofplicare,
to weave), is to intertwine or weave together the branches of a tree; the
same as 'pleach,' as in the ' pleached bower,' of Much Ado About Nothing,
iii. I.
1. 447. The name Chanticleer, used by all our poets from Chaucer downwards, as a proper name for the cock, is derived from the popular mediaeval
romance of 'Reynard the Fox.'
1. 449. Cp. Chaucer, Nonnes Preestes Tale (Cant. Tales, 1. 15,188)
'He clukketh whan he hath a corn yfound,
And to him rennen than his wives alle.
Thus real, as a prince is in his halle,
Leve I this Chaunteclere in his pasture.




THE WINTER EVENING.


257


1. 460. Ebriety (from Lat. ebrius, drunken) is now supplanted by the
compound word 'inebriety;' where the prefix in is not privative, but
intensive.
1. 475. Takes a Lethean leave of all his toil;-that is, forgets it all.
' Lethe, the river of oblivion' (Gr. A;kTO/, forgetfulness), was that ' slow and
silent stream' in Hades,
' whereof who drinks,
Forthwith his former state and being forgets,
Forgets both joy and grief, pleasure and pain.'
Par. Lost, ii. 582-6.
All human souls, on entering Hades, had to drink of the waters of Lethe,
that they might lose the remembrance of their earthly existence. Cp. Virgil,
Aen. vi. 713:
Animae, quibus altera fato
Corpora debentur, Lethaei ad fluminis undam
Securos latices et longa oblivia potant.'
II. 482-4. Cp. Par. Lost, ii. 907:
' Chaos umpire sits,
And by decision more embroils the fray.'
1. 507. Midas, king of Phrygia, in return for his hospitality to Silenus,
was endowed with the power of turning whatever he touched into gold.
Finding that his very food became gold in his mouth, he prayed for the recall
of the gift. To secure his release, he was bidden to bathe in the river
Pactolus; the sands of which became thenceforward golden.
11. 515-6. Maro (i.e. Virgil) in his Eclogues: Sir Philip Sidney in his
Arcadia, a Pastoral Romance, published in I590.
1. 517. Nymphs were Dianas then;-Diana was the Virgin Goddess, the
exemplar and the patroness of chastity. Cp. Much Ado about Nothing,
iv. I:
'You were to me as Dian in her orb,
As chaste as is the bud ere it be blown.'
1. 521. as they sing. See Virgil, Georg. ii 473:
'Sacra deum, sanctique patres: extrema per illos
Justitia excedens terris vestigia fecit.'
1. 528. gay delirium. Cp. Cicero, De Nat. Deor., lib. i. 42: 'Exposui
fere non philosophorum judicia, sed delirantium somnia.'
1. 533. tramontane;-foreign, strange; properly, belonging to countries
'beyond the mountains' (Lat. trans montes). The North Wind is called in
Italy ' La Tramontana,' because it blows across the Alps.
1. 541. Cp. Addison's paper on the ladies' head-dresses in his day, Spectator, No. 98: ' I remember several ladies that were once near seven feet
high, that at present want some inches of five... I very much admire
that those female architects who raise such wonderful structures out of
VOL. II.                       S




258


THE TASK. V.


ribands, lace, and wire, have not been recorded for their respective inventions.'
1. 552. See note on Bk. i. 26o.
11. 566-71. This reference to house-breakers may have been suggested to
the Poet by the recent experience of Lady Austen. In August 1782, soon
after her return to Clifton Reynes, her brother-in-law, the Rev. Mr. Jones,
Curate of that parish, went to London. Thereupon for several successive
nights, the house was visited by villains, who were at length detected in
removing a pane of glass from the kitchen window, to effect an entrance.
The ladies of the house fled in alarm to Mrs. Unwin's protection; and ' men
furnished with firearms were put into the house' till Mr. Jones's return.
Lady Austen, unable to 'repose in a place where she had been so much
terrified,' remained as Mrs. Unwin's guest, until the Vicarage-House was
prepared for her to lodge in.-See letter to Unwin, S. ii. 443.
1. 579. Cp. Bk. v. 592-5, and Par. Lost, xii. 105:
'Thus will this latter, as the former world,
Still tend from bad to worse.'
Horat. Carm. lib. iii. vi. 46:
'Aetas parentum, pejor avis, tulit
Nos nequiores, mox daturos
Progeniem vitiosiorem.'
Eurip. Hippolytus, 1. 937:
ri sp ua 7ro'xTs Kat Opdsaovs 'yevaErat;
el yap KOar' dvaps Bio7ov r oykcl&Jaerat
8 5' rTTEpos T70  irp6faev els btfep3oA
wravoiopyos a'f7a, Oeofiat irpoBriaXeiv XOovl
6XArYv 8E5set 'ya'av.
I. 596. Cp. Romans xiii. 4.
11. 600-3. See note on Table Talk, I. 312.
11. 605-It. See note on Bk. iii. 795.
1. 607. Cp.'Julius Caesar, iv. 3:
' Let me tell you, Cassius, you yourself
Are much condemn'd to have an itching palm;
To sell and mart your offices for gold
To undeservers.'
1. 627. Is balloted. This balloting, which gave rise to the phrase ' drawn
for the Militia,' was discontinued in 1830.
1. 642. The use of hair powder, which had been compulsory in the British
army, was discontinued by a general order, dated Nov. 2, 1 799;  the late
general bad harvest having rendered this measure indispensable.' See Notes
and Queries, 4th Ser. ix. 402.
II. 671-83. Cp. Southey's Colloquies on Society, vol. ii. p. 193:-' There
is no corporate conscience. Men who act in bodies, it matters not whether




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


259 -

large or small, mobs, senates, or cabinets, will without hesitation take their
share in measures which, if proposed to any one of them as an individual,
would make him reply with the Syrian,-Am I a dog that I should do this
thing?'
11. 68I-3. The reference is to the East India Company. See note on
Bk. i. 738.
1. 707. Tityrus;-The name of the rustic swain in the first Eclogue of
Virgil. Spenser calls Chaucer,
'The god of shepherds, Tityrus.'
(Shepherd's Calendar, June, st. I.)
1. 723. Abraham Cowley (born 16i8, died i667) was, like Cowper,
educated at Westminster School; and like Cowper, was celebrated in his
day not only as a Poet, but as a letter-writer. After many vicissitudes
occasioned by his adherence to the Royalist cause, he obtained, on the death
of Cromwell, a lease of a farm at Chertsey: and
'There the last numbers flow'd from Cowley's tongue.'
(Pope's Windsor Forest, 1. 270.)
1. 757. Well;-The Poet seems to mean that the citizen's garden, as
being a confined space hemmed in by high brick walls, is more like a * well'
than a garden.
1. 765. The Frenchman's darling;-' Mignonette.' —C
BOOK V.-The Winter Morning Walk.
1. 7. Shakspeare more properly applies the epithet 'uneffectual' to the
light of the glow-worm;-Hamlet, i. 5:
' And 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire.'
1. 22. Bents; -(Germ. binse, rush) culms of pasture grasses; which being
neither mown nor eaten, stand up as dry stalks. Cp. ' A Tale,' 1. 40 (p. 214 )
1. 42. Cp. Bk. vi. 842; and Par. Lost, iii. 46.
1. IOI. This is a description of Lavendon Mill, which is now displaced by
a cotton mill.
1. 122. Cp. Wordsworth's Excursion, Bk. iii. 130:
The sport of Nature, aided by blind chance,
Rudely to mock the works of toiling man.'
And the same, Bk. vi. 323:
"Twas Nature's will; who sometimes undertakes
For the reproof of human vanity,
Art to outstrip in her peculiar walk.'
And again in his 2nd Sonnet on Staffa:
' The pillar'd vestibule,
Expanding yet precise, the arching roof,
S2




26o


THE TASK. V.


Might seem design'd to humble man, when proud
Of his best workmanship by plan and tool.'
11. 127-68. This famous ice-palace was erected in I 740, by order of the
Empress Anna,'on the banks of the Neva. It was constructed of blocks of
ice hewn out of that river, and had all its furniture and ornaments made
also of ice. In this palace, which lasted from January till March, I740,
Prince Golitzin had to pass his bridal night on his second marriage, which
was displeasing to the Empress.
1. 137. Aristaeus, son of Phoebus by the water-niymph Cyrene, had been
deprived of his bees, because it was through him that Eurydice (the wife of
Orpheus) came to her death. The ' plaintive tale' to his mother is given by
Virgil, Georg. iv. 317.
1. I40. Arrowy sleet:-Cp. Par. Regained, iii. 324:
' Sharp sleet of arrowy showers against the face.'
And Gray, ' The Fatal Sisters,' st. 1:
' Iron sleet of arrowy shower
Hurtles in the darken'd air.'
But in these and many such like passages which might be adduced, the
arrows are likened to sleet; not (as here) the sleet to arrows.
1. I45. I Kings vi. 7. Cp. Heber's Palestine:
'No workman's steel, no ponderous axes rang,
Like some tall palm the noiseless fabric sprang.'
1. 147. cement. Notice the accent on the first syllable, a mode of pronunciation now almost obsolete. Cp. G. Herbert, The Altar:
'A broken Altar, Lord, Thy servant rears,
Made of a heart, and cemented with tears.'
And Pope's Dunciad, iv. 267:
' With the same cement, ever sure to bind.'
In The Task, ii. 437 (p. 37), the line began thus, in the editions'of 1785
and I786,-' At conventicle heard; ' and was altered in ed. 1787 to the present reading, viz.-' Heard at conventicle.' Cp. Butler's Hudibras, Pt. I. ii.
438:
'Like ram or bull at conventicle,'
And Garth's Dispensary, Canto iv:
' A conventicle flush'd his greener years.'
In The Retired Cat, 1. 27 (p. 209), we find utensil for the modern' utensil.'
Cp. Prior's Vanity of the World, Bk. iii. I 78:
' And after Utensils their place supply.'
Cowper has also desserts for' dess6rts' (Pity for Poor Africans, 1.8, p. i9I),
sinister for ' sinister ' (Friendship, 1. 53); and consummate (as an adj.) for
' consummate ' (Expostulation, 1. 315). The Empiric of The Task, ii. 352;
and the phlegmatic of Expost. 1. 296, are now commonly pronounced ' empiric ' and ' phlegmatic.'




THE WINTER MORNING TWALK.


261


1. 178. Dinocrates, a sculptor of Macedonia, offered to cut Mount Athos
into the figure of Alexander the Great, holding in his left hand the walls for
a great city, and in his right a basin to receive all the waters flowing from
the mountain. The king, however, declined the honour.
1. 181. 'What a lie,' writes Abp. Trench, 'lurks at the root of our present use of the word " indolence."  This is from " in " and " doleo," not to
grieve; and " indolence " is thus a state in which we have no grief or pain;
so that the word.. seems to affirm that indulgence in sloth and ease is that
which would constitute for us the absence of all pain. Cowper spoke only
truth when, perhaps proposing expressly to witness against the falsehood of
this word, he spoke of
"Lives spent in indolence and therefore sad,"
not " therefore glad," as the word would promise.' On the Study of Words,
ed. 1852, p. 202. See note on Bk. i. 755. In Scotland, a favourite phrase
with indolent persons is, ' I canna' be fashed,' 'ne'er fash yourself,' &c.
This word ' fash' is the Fr.faicher (formerly fascher, from Prov. fastigar),
to vex, grieve, afflict. The Lat. word ' indolentia' itself was coined by
Cicero, (as would appear from his De Finibus, ii. 4) as an equivalent for the
dndaOEr a of the Greek philosophy; that is, a state of freedom from passion and
pain. The English word was originally used in the same scholastic sense.
Thus Cowper's ancestor, Dr. John Donne, writes in his Sermons (1640, p. I56)
that Christ 'came nearer to an excess of passion than to an indolency, to a
senselessness, to a privation of natural affections.'  Addison writes in The
Spectator, No. 381 (I7r2), 'A  good mind may bear up under them,' (viz.
'pain and sickness, shame and reproach, poverty and old age'), ' with fortitude, with indolence, and with cheerfulness of heart.' And Dr. Berkeley writes
in the Guardian, No. 62 (May'22, I713), 'When men come to riper years,
the innocent diversions which exalted the spirits, and produce health of body,
indolence of mind, and refreshing slumbers, are too often exchanged for
criminal delights, which fill the soul with anguish, and the body with disease.'
1 I83. The Mausoleum, one of the ' seven wonders of the world,' was the
monument of Mausolus, king of Caria (B.C. 377-53), erected by his widow,
Artemisia, at Halicarnassus, B.c. 353.
1. I86. Cp. Hor. Epist. I. ii. 14:
' Quicquid delirant reges, plectuntur Achivi.'
1. 193. Genesis xi. 3-9.
1. 217. Not Tubal (Gen. x. 2); but Tubal Cain (Gen. iv. 22): called
' Vulcan,' because the latter was the blacksmith-god, having his workshop in
the crater of Mount Aetna.
1. 240. Cp. Milton, Sonnet xiii:
'Peace hath her victories,
No less renown'd than War.'
1. 270. Cp. Table Talk, 1. 50.




262


THE TASK. V.


1. 273. gears;-traces, harness for draught. The word survives in the
phrase ' out of gear;' properly said of machinery that is loosened from its
traces.'
1. 316. doit;-the Dutch dolt or doitken (Germ. Deut), a very small coin
(-f=   of a guilder). Cp. Tempest, ii. 2: 'They will not give a doit to
relieve a lame beggar; they will lay out ten to see a dead Indian.' The
phrase is equivalent to the French 'pas un sou;' or the American one, ' his
last cent.'
1. 321. Judges ix. 3-15.
1. 341. ' My sentiments on the subject of Charles' decollation are peculiar,
at least I believe they are so.  I think it was a good deed, but ill done;
that his life was forfeit, but taken away upon wrong motives.'-To Unwin,
Oct. 20, 1784.
1. 378. 'The author hopes that he shall not be accused for unnecessary
warmth upon so interesting a subject. He is aware that it is become almost
fashionable to stigmatize such sentiments as no better than empty declamation: but it is an ill symptom, and peculiar to modern times.'-C. Fox quoted
this passage on the destruction of the Bastille, in the House of Commons.
(Hayley, ed. 1812, iv. I93.)
1. 383. The Bastille was erected by Charles V. in 1369, as a royal chateau,
for the defence of Paris against the English; and was completed in 1383.
It was called ' The Building,' (the name being from the Old French bastir
-now bdtir, to build), par excellence; just as we speak of ' The Tower,' or
'The Mansion House;' or as we read in St. Luke xiii. 4, of 'the tower (i. e.
the well-known tower, 6 7irSpos) in Siloam.' King Louis XI. was the first to
use the Bastille as a state prison. Henri IV. assaulted it in vain in the siege
of Paris, during the war (I587-94). The mysterious 'Man with the Iron
Mask' died a prisoner there, Nov. 19, I703.  The Bastille was destroyed
by the Parisians in the French Revolution, July 14, 1789; when its
Governor and other officers had their hands and heads cut off, and the latter
were paraded on pikes through the streets.
1. 400. Daniel iv. Io-I8.
1. 420. The walls of the Beauchamp Tower in the Tower of London, for
instance, are covered with the inscriptions of the illustrious prisoners who
have been therein confined.
1. 422. Cp. Byron's Prisoner of Chillon, st. 14:
' With spiders I had friendship made,
And watch'd them in their sullen trade.'
1. 444. The Manichaeans, a sect of heretics dating from the middle of the
third century, were the followers of Manes, a Persian, who had been ordained as a priest, but was expelled from the Church and put to death as
a false teacher, A.D. 277.  St. Augustine in early youth embraced this
heresy, of which he was afterwards a principal opponent.  Manes taught




THE WINTER MORNING WAL.K                        263
that there were two Gods, contrary and co-eternal, the one good and the
other evil (the Ormuz and Ahriman of the heresiarch's old Persian theology); and that the world was created by the Evil Deity.
1. 462. Cp. Bk. ii. 214, and note thereon.
1. 486. John Hampden was an ' almost solitary instance of a great man
who neither sought nor shunned greatness, who found glory only because
glory lay in the plain path of duty.' (Macaulay's Essays, ed. 1854, i. 191.)
Born in 1594, he first distinguished himself by his opposition to the exaction
of ship-money. Having taken up arms against the royal cause, he was
mortally wounded in an engagement with Prince Rupert at Chalgrove Field,
near Oxford, in 1643; and died with the prayer on his lips,' Lord Jesus,
receive my spirit! O Lord, save my country!' Algernon Sidney, son of
Robert second Earl of Leicester, was born in 1621; espoused the side of the
Parliament, and was nominated as one of the King's Judges, but refused to
take part in the execution of Charles, and retired into private life on Cromwell's assuming the title of Protector. Though promised security in I667,
he was tried before Judge Jefferies on a charge of being concerned in the
Rye House Plot, and illegally executed in i683. Cp. Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Sketches, Sonnet ix. Pt. 3:
'Ungrateful country, if thou e'er forget
The sons who for thy civil rights have bled;
How, like a Roman, Sidney bow'd his head.'
1. 502. the charities;-Cp. Par. Lost, iv. 756:
'Relations dear, and all the charities
Of father, son, and brother.'
Cicero, De Offic. i. 17: ' Sed quum omnia ratione animoque lustraris, omnium
societatum nulla est gravior, nulla carior, quam ea quae cum republica est
unicuique nostrum. Cari sunt parentes, cari liberi, propinqui, familiares: sed
omnes omnium caritates patria una complexa est.'
1. 555. Cp. St. John i. 3.
1. 562. Cp. 2 Peter iii. 10-I3.
1. 567. Cp. Psalm xiv. I.
1. 585. propense;-prone, disposed by nature.  Milton has 'hearts propense to waver,' Samson Agon. 1. 455.
1. 594. Cp. Bk. iv. 579; and Par. Lost, iv. 76:
'And in the lowest deep a lower deep,
Still threatening to devour me, opens wide,
To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heaven.'
1. 625. A presage ominous;-as leading to 'pride, which goeth before
destruction;' Proverbs xvi. I8.
1. 635. Cp. Genesis iii. I.
1. 650. Cp. Bk. ii. 432-7; and Churchill's Dedication to his Sermons,
1. 6I:




264


THE TASK. V.


'No; 'tis thy inward man, thy proper worth,
Thy life and doctrine uniformly join'd,
And flowing from that wholesome source, thy mind;
Thy virtue, not thy rank, demands my lays,
'Tis not the Bishop, but the Saint, I praise.'
G. Herbert, Country Parson, ch. 3: ' Neither will they believe him in the
pulpit, whom they cannot trust in his conversation.' Some one has well said,
' The parson's life is his best sermon.' Yet Pope has pushed this sentiment
to a sophism;-Essay on Man, Epist. iii. 305:
'For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight:
His can't be wrong, whose life is in the right.'
Cicero argues well against the converse of this: Tusc. Disput., lib. ii. capp. 4,
5: ' Quod est enim majus argumentum, nihil philosophiam prodesse, quam
quosdam perfectos philosophos turpiter vivere?  Nullum  vero id quidem
argumentum  est; nam ut agri non omnes frugiferi sunt qui coluntur, sic
animi non omnes culti fiuctum ferunt.' And then he goes on with an exact
parallel to our Lord's Parable of the Sower.
1. 671. Cp. Psalm lxviii. 5.
1. 673. Cp. Par. Lost, iv. 846:
'Abash'd the Devil stood,
And felt how awful goodness is, and saw
Virtue in her shape how lovely!'
And Cicero, De Officiis, lib. i. cap. 5: ' Formam  quidem ipsam et tanquam
faciem honesti vides: quae si oculis cerneretur, mirabiles amores (ut ait
Plato) excitaret sapientiae.' The passage of Plato referred to is in the
Phaedrus, ch. 65: j cPpb6vr)'ts ovX opdraLr &eyobs Yaip av 7rapeFXev erpwTas
el TOIOVTO &CVT7vS evap'ys 4ftwAov lrapeiXe7o tes 6itv cov.
1. 675. The First and only Fair. Cp. Pope's Essay on Man, Epist.
ii. 23:
'Go, soar with Plato to the empyreal sphere,
To the first Good, first Perfect, and first Fair.'
1. 68I. Cp. I Corinthians xiii. I.
1. 685. Cp. I Kings xix. I2.
1. 702. Cp. Isaiah xi. 8; and 2 Corinthians xii. 9.
1. 706. Horat. Carm. lib. IV. ix. Io:
'Spirat adhuc amor
Vivuntque commissi calores
Aeoliae fidibus puellae.'
1. 718. Cp. Par. Lost, ix. 28:
'Wars, hitherto the only argument
Heroic deem'd, chief mast'ry to dissect
With long and tedious havoc, fabled Knights
In battles feign'd; the better fortitude




THE WINTER MORNING WALK.


Of patience and heroic martyrdom
Unsung.'
11. 726-32. Cp. Par. Lost, xi. 698:
'Thus fame shall be achieved, renown on Earth;
And what most merits fame in silence hid.'
1. 732. 'See Hume'-C.    [Chap. xxvii.; 'The glory of martyrdom
stimulates all the more furious zealots,' &c.]
1. 733. Cp. St. John viii. 32.
1. 737. Judges xvi. 7-10o.
11. 738-43. Cp. Young, Ist Essay to Pope (S. vi. 120):
'These, Nature's commoners, who want a home,
Claim the wide world for their majestic dome.'
1. 744. propriety;-a sense of absolute personal possession or property
(from Latin proprium). Cp. Par. Lost, iv. 750:
'Hail wedded love, mysterious law, true source
Of human offspring, sole propriety
In Paradise of all things common else.'
Owen Felltham, writing on the same subject (1628), says: ' The best
chastity of all I hold to be Matrimoniall chastity: when Paires keepe themselves in a moderate intermutualnesse, each constant to the other. And 'tis
fit even in Nature and Policy, that this propriety should be inviolable.'Resolves, i. 85.
1. 674. Cp. Acts xxii. 39; and Proverbs viii. 23-7.
1, 779. Cp. Job xxii. 21.
1. 785. Cp. Ovid. Metamorph. i. 84:
'Pronaque quum spectent animalia caetera terrain
Os homini sublime dedit, caelumque tueri
Jussit, et erectos ad sidera tollere vultus.'
1. 793. Cp. Pope's Dunciad, iv. 455:
'See nature in some partial narrow shape,
And let the Author of the whole escape.'
1. 802. Result;-here used in its primary and proper sense, ' to leap or fly
back.' So in Pope's Homer's Odyss. xi. 736:
'Up the high hill he heaves a huge round stone;
The huge round stone resulting with a bound
Thunders impetuous down.'
1. 809. Cp. Thomson, Hymn xxviii.:
'But wand'ring oft with brute unconscious gaze,
Man marks not Thee.'
1. 82. Job xxxviii. 7.
1. 828. Cp. Akenside's Pleas. of Imag., 1. 204:
'And fields of radiance, whose unfading light
Has travell'd the profound six thousand years,
Nor yet arrives in sight of mortal things.'




266


TIHE TASK. VI.


1. 846. Cp. Psalm cxix. lo5.
11. 870-3. Cp. Pope's Essay on Man, i. 289:
'All Nature is but Art, unknown to thee;
All Chance, direction which thou canst not see.
Book VI.-The Winter Walk at Noon.
I. I. Cp. Matt. Green, The Spleen, ii. 147-53:
'Many have held the soul to be
Nearly allied to harmony;..
And own, neglecting sorrow's wound,
The consanguinity of sound.'
II. 30-2. Cp. Par. Lost, x. o094:
' In whose look serene,
When angry most he seem'd and most severe
What else but favour, grace, and mercy shone?'
11. 50-3. Cp. Retirement, 1. 406; where see note.
11. 54-6. 'Long before The Task was published, I made an experiment
/ one day, being in a frolicksome mood, upon a friend. We were walking in
/ the garden, and conversing on a subject similar to these lines' [viz. the three
above indicated],' I repeated them, and said to him with an air of nonchalance, "Do you recollect those lines?  I have seen them somewhere;
where are they?" He put on a considering face, and after some deliberation
replied, " Oh! I will tell you where they must be; in the Night Thoughts."
I was glad my trial turned out so well, and did not undeceive him. At the
same time I do assure you, on the faith of an honest man, that I never
in my life designed an imitation of Young, or of any other writer, for
mimicry is my abhorrence,-at least in Poetry.'- To Lady Hesketh,
May 25, 1786.
11. 57-82. Here follows a description of the walk leading up from the
Rustic Bridge to the Alcove. Cp. note on Bk. ii. 278.
1. 66. embattled tower;-of Emberton Church.
11. 76-84. Cp. W. Browne, Britannia's Pastorals, Bk. II. i. 789-96:
'Clamour grew dumb, unheard was shepherd's song,
And silence girt the wood...
Only the curled streams soft chidings kept;
And little gales in fearful whisp'rings stirred
As loath to waken any singing bird.'
11. 88-97. Cp. Selden's Table Talk: 'No man is the wiser for his
learning; it may administer matter to work in, or objects to work upon;
but wit and wisdom are born with man.'
So Francis Quarles, in his Emblems:




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


267


'The curious hand of Knowledge doth but pick
Bare simples; Wisdom pounds them for the sick.
Knowledge, when Wisdom is too weak to guide her,
Is like a headstrong horse that throws the rider.'
Young's Love of Fame, Sat. vi. (S. vi. I29):
'Knowledge, of unmade happiness
The rude material,-Wisdom add to this;
Wisdom the sole artificer of bliss.'
Par. Lost, vii. 126:
'But Knowledge is as food, and needs no less
Her temperance over appetite, to know
In measure what the mind may well contain;
Oppresses else with surfeit, and soon turns
Wisdom to folly, as nourishment to wind.'
With this Mr. Keightley compares Sir W. Davenant's poem on Gondibert
(1651), ii. 8. 22:
'For though books are as diet for the mind,
If Knowledge, early got, self-value breeds,
By false digestion it is tur'd to wind,
And what should nourish on the eater feeds.'
1. Ioi. Cp. Pope's Essay on Criticism, 1. 418:
'What woful stuff this madrigal would be,
In some starved hackney sonnetteer, or me!
But let a lord once own the happy lines,
How the wit brightens! how the style refines!'
1. I02. Cp. Table Talk, 1. 542; and Pope's Essay on Criticism, 1. 305:
'Others for language all their care express,
And value books, as women men, for dress;
Their praise is still-The style is excellent!
The sense, they humbly take upon content.'
1. 126. Joshua x. 12-14.
11. 127-9. Cp. Psalm civ. r9.
11. 140-46. Cp. Thomson's Seasons, Winter, 1065:
' Yet bear up a while,
And what your bounded view, which only saw
A little part, deem'd evil, is no more;
The storms of wintry time will quickly pass,
And one unbounded Spring encircle all.'
Keble's Christian Year, 23rd Sunday after Trinity:
'Soon o'er their heads blithe April airs shall sing,
A thousand wild-flowers round them shall unfold,
The green buds glisten in the dews of Spring,
And all be vernal rapture as of old.'




268


THE TASK. VI.


1. 142. Cp. Virgil, Aen. iii. 23:
'Virgulta, et densis hastilibus horrida myrtus.'
1. I52. the other;-' The Guelder Rose.'-C.
1. I65. Hypericum perforatum;-St. John's wort.
1. I67. Mezerion;-spurge laurel.
1. 170. Althaea;-the marsh mallow.
1. I78. Cp. Keble's Christian Year, 6th Sunday after Trinity:
'Never so fast, in silent April shower,
Flush'd into green the dry and leafless bower.'
1. i8I. Cp. Pope's Moral Essays, iii. 167:
'Builds life on death, on change duration founds.'
And Rom. and Juliet, ii. 3:
'The Earth, that's Nature's mother, is her tomb;
What is her burying-place, that is her womb.'
Lucret. De Rer. Nat. v. 260:
'Omniparens, eadem rerum commune sepulchrum,
Ergo terra tibi limatur, et aucta recrescit.'
1. i88. Cp. Gray's Elegy in a Country Churchyard, st. 14:
'Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.'
On this the Aldine Ed. of Gray quotes Chamberlayne's Pharonida, Pt. ii. Bk. iv.
p. 94:   'Like beauteous flowers, which vainly waste their scent
Of odours in unhaunted deserts.'
And Young, Univ. Passion, Sat. v. p. I28:
'In distant wilds, by human eyes unseen,
She rears her flowers, and spreads her velvet green.'
Also Pope, Rape of the Lock, iv. 156:
'There kept my charms conceal'd from mortal eye,
Like roses that in deserts bloom and die.'
1. 225. Cp. Virgil, Georgic iv. 220:
'Esse apibus partem divinae mentis, et haustus
Aetherios dixere, deum namque ire per omnes
Terrasque, tractusque maris, caelumque profundum.'
And the same, Aen. vi. 724:
'Principio caelum ac terras, camposque liquentes,
Lucentemque globum lunae, Titaniaque astra
Spiritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus
Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet.'
1. 233. Pomona, the goddess of fruits and fruit trees; Pales, the god of
shepherds, and their flocks and cattle; Pan, the personification of deity as
displayed in creation, and pervading all Nature; Flora, the goddess of
flowers; Vertumnus, the god of the seasons, and of the productions in the
vegetable world, (the husband of Pomona).




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.                         269
1. 255. Cp. Par. Lost, iv. 639:
'With thee conversing, I forget all time;
All seasons and their change, all please alike.'
1. 287. Langford was a noted auctioneer of the day, whose sales of
pictures, books, and articles of vertu, formed a favourite resort for loungers.
He was a predecessor of George Robins in the auction-rooms in Covent
Garden.
I. 298. Proverbs xiv. Io. Cp. Dr. N. Cotton, The Fireside, st. 2:
'No noisy neighbour enters here,
No intermeddling stranger near,
To spoil our heartfelt joys.'
II. 315-20. Cp. Browne, Britannia's Pastorals, Pt. I. v. 697-716:
'Then as a nimble squirrel from the wood,' &c.
1. 369. Cp. Par. Lost, i. I:
'Man's first disobedience, and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste
Brought Death into the world and all our woe.'
1. 404. as likes them. For this archaism cp. Deut. xxiii. I6, 'it liketh
him;' Esther viii. 8, 'as it liketh you;' Amos iv. 5, 'this liketh you.'
'Hym likede' is found in Robert of Gloucester (H. Coleridge's Glossarial
Index of Thirteenth Century Literature). Mr. Aldis Wright gives to the verb
like, when thus used, the transitive sense 'to please.' (Bible Word Book,
1866, p. 296.) But it seems preferable to regard it as one of our old
impersonal verbs;-' an abundance of which (as Mr. Abbott observes) is a
mark of an early stage in a language, denoting that a speaker has not yet
arrived so far in development as to trace his own actions and feelings to his
own agency.' (Shakspearian Grammar, 1871, p. 208.) Cp. 'it repented
the Lord,' Gen. vi. 6; Judges ii. 18; and 'it repenteth Me,' Gen. vi. 7;
I Sam. xv. II; 'it would have pitied a man to see,' 2 Maccabees, iii. 21;
'it dislikes me,' Othel. ii. 3; ' it yearns me not,' Hamlet, v. 4:-and perhaps
the phrases, 'meseems' and 'methinks.' (Cp.
'Where it thinks best unto your royal self.' Rich. III. iii. i).
1. 444. Exodus xxiii. 5.
1. 446. Deut. xxii. 6.
1. 450. Genesis ix. 2, 3.
I. 461. Psalms cxlvii. 9; and civ. 21.
11. 467-70. Numbers xxii. 22-34.
11. 485, 490. Misagathus;-that is, Hate-good (Gr. iuolaw and dya6os).
Evander; that is, Good-man (Gr. Ed and dv4p).
1. 486. atheist in ostent;-' Ostent' (from Lat. ostendere, to shew) means
appearance, show, profession; though sometimes also used in Old English as
equivalent to the modern 'ostentation.'  Shakspeare speaks of 'a sad
ostent,' Mer. of Ven. ii. 2; and of' fair ostents of love,' ibid. ii. 8. Cowper




270


THE TASK. VI.


seems to mean that Misagathus made a hollow, outward profession of
Atheism. The Poet has elsewhere expressed his doubts whether 'earth
bear so base a slave' as a real Atheist: (Prog. of Error, 1. 615).
1. 497. Cp. King Lear, iv. 6:
' The murmuring surge,
That on th' unnumber'd idle pebbles chafes,
Cannot be heard so high.'
1. 514. Cp. Virgil, Aen. iii. 30:
'Gelidusque coit formidine sanguis.'
11. 568-72. See the Colubriad (vol. i. p. I87), and the note thereon. Cp.
Akenside's Inscription for a Grotto, 1. I:
' Chase from all my bounds
Each thing impure or noxious. Enter in,
O stranger, undismay'd. Nor bat, nor toad,
Lurks here.'
And Par. Lost, iv. 703:
'Other creature here,
Bird, beast, insect, or worm, durst enter none.'
1. 634. The Handel Commemoration was held in Westminster Abbey in
June, I784, being the centenary of that Composer's birth. There were 525
performers, and nearly ~I3,ooo were received for the five days' performances, which sum was given to the Fund for decayed Musicians. These
lines were added to the poem during revisal. Mr. Newton had preached at
St. Mary Woolnoth, Lombard Street, in 1784-5,' Fifty Expository Discourses,
on the series of Scriptural Passages which form the subjects of the celebrated
Oratorio of Handel,' which he published in 1786, under the title of Messiah.
Being asked for a motto for this work, Cowper wrote-' There is something
so new and peculiar in the occasion, that I question whether in the classics
can be found a sentiment suited to it. Our sins and follies assume a shape
that heathen writers had never any opportunity to notice. They deified the
dead indeed, but not in the temple of Jupiter. The new-made god had an
altar of his own, and they conducted the ceremony without sacrilege or confision.'-To Newton, July 9, I785. ' So then, because Handel set anthems
to music, you sing them in honour of Handel; and because he composed
the music of Italian songs, you sing them in a Church. Truly Handel is
much obliged to you, but God is greatly dishonoured.'-To Unwin, Nov.
20,1784.
1. 652. Buckram (from Fr. bougram) is a kind of strong linen cloth,
stiffened with gum or glue, and used by tailors and stay-makers.  The
word is likewise found used as an adj., as in the case of Falstaffs 'two
rogues in buckram suits,' (2 Henry IV, ii. 4); and this sometimes in a
metaphorical sense, as in the phrase ' buckram bishops' (Fulke's Answer to
Allen, p, 301), ie. stiff, precise, formal:-cp. ' starched.' Much like this is




THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.


271


Cowper's use of the word in a letter to Lady Hesketh, Dec. 15, 1785: 'Homer
is, on occasions that call for that style, the easiest and most familiar of all
writers: a circumstance that escaped Pope entirely, who takes most religious
care that he shall everywhere strut in buckram.' As buckram was often
used as a stiff lining, placed beneath a frailer texture to make it stand out
firmly, the expression ' to buckram out' a thing came to be applied metaphorically, as in our text.
1. 658. Ely Place, Holborn; so called as having been originally the London
residence of the Bishops of Ely. Here John of Gaunt died in I399. And
here two of the Poet's ancestors were kept in confinement as Loyalists,
during the Commonwealth: Sir William Cowper the first Baronet of Rattling
Court, and his son John, who died a prisoner in Ely Place.
1. 660. William, Duke of Cumberland (and Marquess of Berkhampstead,
Cowper's native place), was third son of George II, was born in 1721, and
died in 1765. He defeated at Culloden, April I6, 1746, Charles Edward
the 'Young Pretender,' grandson of James II. The news of this victory
reached London just at the hour of morning service on Sunday; and the
loyal chapel-clerk, having his head full of nothing else, gave out the Psalm
with the formula ' Let us sing to the praise and glory of King George.' See
Introduction, ~ 3 (vol. i, p. xlix).
1. 662. eke;-also; from Ang. Sax. eacan, to add. Cp. John Gilpin, 11.
3,92.
1. 682. Garrick's Shakspeare Jubilee was held at Stratford-on-Avon in
September, I769.
1. 686. The Mulberry Tree planted by Shakspeare in his garden at New
Place, Stratford, (purchased by him from the Underwood family in i597):from the wood of which tree snuff-boxes and other relics were freely handed
about for sale at this Jubilee.
1. 729. Cp. Romans viii. 22.
11. 747-8 8. This view of the restoration of all things' was the specimen
extract that Cowper sent to Mr. Newton, when he first informed the latter
that he was 'again at Johnson's.' (Oct. 30, 1784.) To Unwin alone had he
confided the secret of his Poem during its progress. 'As I have admitted
into my description no images but what are scriptural, and have aimed as
exactly as I could at the plain and simple sublimity of the Scripture language,
I have hopes the manner of it may please you. As far as the numbers and
diction are concerned, it may serve pretty well for a sample of the whole.'
-To Newton, Nov. 27, 1784.
1. 754. From Addison's Tragedy of Cato:
'True, she is fair-oh! how divinely fair!'
1. 766. Psalm lxv. 14 (Prayer-book Version).
1. 768. Cp. Genesis iii. 17, i8.
1. 773. Libbard;-old poetical form of' leopard.' Spenser has the word,




272


THE TASK. VI.


Faery Queene, i. 6. 25; and Shakspeare, Love's Labour's Lost, v. 2.  Ben
Jonson, in the Masque of Queens, calls the Aconite libbard's-bane.
1. 774. Isaiah lxv. 25.
1. 778. Cp. Isaiah xi. 8.
1. 780. In defence of this use of the word worm in its old sense of ' serpent,' Cowper reminds Mr. Newton of Par. Lost (ix. Io68), and of Ant. and
Cleop. v. 2; and adds, ' A worm is a small serpent, and a serpent is a large
worm. And when an epithet significant of the most terrible species of those
creatures is adjoined, the idea is surely sufficiently ascertained. No animal
of the vermicular or serpentine kind is crested, but the most formidable of
all.'-To Newton, Dec. II, 1784. Moreover, worm is pure Scandinavian
for a serpent.
1. 799. See Salem built;-that is, ' The holy city, new Jerusalem, coming
down from God out of heaven,' Rev. xxi. 2i.
1. 80o. ' Nebaioth and Kedar, the sons of Ishmael, and progenitors of the
Arabs, in the prophetic Scripture here alluded to [Isaiah Ix. 3-7] may be
reasonably considered as representatives of the Gentiles at large.'-C.
1. 792. Rev. v. 9, 12.
1. 806. Cp. Par. Lost, ii. I:
'High on a throne of royal state, which far
Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind,
Or where the gorgeous East with richest hand
Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold.'
But it does not appear why Cowper says ' the looms of Ormus.' Ormus,
an island in the Persian Gulf, produced nothing lhut salt; but in I567 the
Portuguese were allowed to make it an entrepot-a sort of Oriental Venice
-through which diamonds (and doubtless also ' pearl and gold') were passed
from India to Persia. These diamonds formed a principal part of the wealth
of India (where they were found), and of Ormus, which was the mart for
them. Possibly Cowper originally wrote ' the gems of Ormus.' Such a reading does not appear in any of the editions; but the substitution of the one
word for the other is conceivable, if the copy were written down from the
Poet's dictation.
1. 807. Saba;-i.e. Arabia Felix. Cp. Par. Lost, iv. i62:
'Sabaean odours from the spicy shore
Of Araby the blest.'
1. 8io. Cp. Isaiah Ix. 18.
1. 817. Saw never. Cowper is fond of this cadence, cp. Bk. i. 556; vi. 443.
He learned it from his master, Milton. Cp. ' which my mind knew never,'
Par. Lost, v. 35; ' such as heard in heaven till now was never,' ibid. vi. 209.
1. 868. Cp. Rev. vi. 5-17.
1. 871. Cp. 2 Pet. iii. 4.
1. 884. Theophilus Lindsey, A.M., who was appointed to the Vicarage of




TIR OCINI UM.


273


Catterick near Richmond, in Yorkshire, 1763, was one of many clergymen
of his day who embraced Unitarian opinions. In I77I he took an active
part in an Association for securing the Relief of the Clergy from the necessity
of subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles. A petition to this effect was
presented to the House of Commons, Feb. 6, 1772, signed by more than
200 of the Clergy; but being opposed by Lord North, Charles Fox, and
(strange to say) Edmund Burke, it was rejected on a division by 217 to 71.
On Nov. 12, I773, Mr. Lindsey resigned his living; and thereupon opened
a chapel in Essex Street, Strand, in which he used the Church Liturgy, 'reformed' in accordance with the suggestions of Dr. Samuel Clarke. His
example was followed by several other beneficed clergymen, on the same
grounds; and amongst them, by Dr. John Jebb, F.R.S. (who became a
physician); and Dr. John Disney, who in 1782 resigned his Rectory of Pan-,
ton and Vicarage of Swinderby in Yorkshire, and afterwards became Mr.
Lindsey's successor in the Essex Street Chapel. A memoir of Mr. Lindsey,
by T. Belsham, was published in London, I873, as a centenary volume. Cp.
Contemp. Review for April, 1874, p. 747.
1. 898. Cp. St. Jude, verse 13.
1. 949. Genesis xxiv. 63.
1. 986. Cp. Pope's Essay on Criticism, ii. 335:
'Be not the first by whom the new are tried,
Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.'
11. Ioo6-I6. The Poet here alludes to the fact that The Task, which
he had commenced in June, 1783, 'in obedience to the fair' Lady Austen,
was continued in the graver tone which was more likely to please Mrs.
Unwin, after his rupture with Lady Austen in May, 1784. See Life,
pp. xxix, xxx.
1. 1024. ' What there is of a religious cast in the volume I have thrown
towards the end of it, for two reasons; first, that I might not revolt the
reader at his entrance,-and secondly, that my best impressions might be
made last. Were I to write as many volumes as Lope de Vega, or Voltaire,
not one of them would be without this tincture.'-To Unwin, Oct. Io, 1784.
The judgment of the world has justified the anticipation of the Poet, who
wrote thus to Mr. Newton, Dec. 1, 1784:-' Though as little apt to
be sanguine as most men, and more prone to fear and despond, than to
overrate my own productions, I am persuaded that I shall not forfeit anything by this volume, that I gained by the last.'
TIROCINIUM.
This Poem was commenced in I782, when it "grew to the length of
200 lines, and then stopped.' —To Unwin, Oct. 20, 1784. The Poet
resumed it two years later; and the date of its completion is fixed by
the dedication to the Rev. W. C. Unwin,' The Tutor of his two sons,'
VOL. II.                      T




274


TIROCINIUM.


Nov. 6, 1784. It was published with The Task, in July, 1785. 'I am
mistaken, if Tirocinium do not make some of my friends angry, and procure
me enemies not a few. There is a sting in verse, that prose neither has, nor
can have: and I do not know that schools in the gross, and especially
public schools, have ever been so pointedly condemned before. But
they are becoming a nuisance, a pest, an abomination; and it is fit that the
eyes and noses of mankind should, if possible, be open to perceive it.'-To
Unwin, May 8, 1784. ' It treats of the scandalous relaxation of discipline
that obtains in almost all schools... It recommends the office of tutor to
the father, where there is no real impediment; the expedient of a domestic
tutor where there is; and the disposal of boys into the hands of a respectable
country clergyman, who limits his attention to two, in all cases where
they cannot be conveniently educated at home.'-To Newton, Nov. 27,
1784. The motto was furnished by Mr. Bull, in reply to the following
humorous request (Nov. 8, 1784):-' Find me one in any of your multitudinous volumes, no matter whether it be taken from Burgersdicius,
Bogtrottius, or Puddengulpius, the more recondite the better; the world will
suppose at least that I am familiar with the author whom I quote: and
though the supposition will be an erroneous one, it will do them no harm,
and me some good.'
1. 33. Cp. Romans ii. I5.
1. I20. The Horn-book is a thing of the past. It was' the alphabet-book,
which was a thin board of oak, about nine inches long, and five or six wide,
on which was printed the alphabet, the nine digits, and sometimes the Lord's
Prayer, It had a handle, and was covered in front with a sheet of thin
horn, to prevent its being soiled. The board and its horn cover were held
together by a narrow frame or border of brass.'-Brewer's Dict. of Phrase
and Fable, p. 417.
1. 135. Dreamer; —John Bunyan.
1. 163. See 2 Chron. xxvi. 19.
1. 197. ' The author begs leave to explain:-Sensible that without such
knowledge neither the ancient poets and historians can be tasted, or indeed
understood, he does not mean to censure the pains that are taken to instruct
a schoolboy in the religions of the heathen; but merely that neglect of
Christian culture, which leaves him shamefully ignorant of his own.'-C.
Cowper tells us that he 'acquired Latin and Greek at the expense of much
more important knowledge' (S. i. 8); having left Westminster 'tolerably
well furnished with grammatical knowledge, but as ignorant of all kinds
of religion as the satchel at his back.' (S. i. I4.)
1. 230. Hairbreadth scapes;-Othello, i. 3.
1. 266. Ubiquarian. I do not know the Poet's authority for this word,
which is not in the Dictionaries. The usual form of the adjective is
ubiquitary;' for which ' ubiquitous' is sometimes used colloquially.




TIROCINIUM.


275


1. 267. See 2 Kings v. 26.
1. 36I. This classical use of the word 'prolix,' in the sense of 'long and
loose' (Lat. pro laxus), is rare in English.
1. 421. Cp. 1. 826.
1. 435. Dr. Robert Lowth (born 17I0, died 1787) was the son of Dr.
William Lowth, the Commentator. Having been educated at Winchester
and New College, he became successively Bishop of St. David's in 1766; of
Oxford in the same year; and of London, I777-87. He had been appointed as Professor of Poetry at Oxford in 1741: and in 1753 he published
his Praelections, under the title of De Sacra Poesi Hebraeorum. His other
works were, a Life of William of Wykeham, 1758; an Introduction to
English Grammar, 1761; and a Translation of the Prophet Isaiah, 1778.
Dr. Lewis Bagot, fifth son of Sir Walter Wagstaffe Bagot, fifth Baronet
of Blithfield, Staffordshire, and brother of William first Lord Bagot, was
born in I740, and died in I802. Proceeding from Westminster to Oxford,
he became successively Dean of Christ Church; Bishop of Bristol in I782;
of Norwich in I783; and of St. Asaph, I790-I802. The Poet gives
Unwin his 'reasons for the compliment,' thus:-' I wished the world to
know that I have no objection to a bishop, qud bishop. In the second
place, the brothers were all five my schoolfellows; and very amiable and
valuable boys they were. Thirdly, Lewis, the Bishop, had been rudely and
coarsely treated in the Monthly Review, on account of a sermon which
appeared to me, when I read their extract from it, to deserve the highest
commendation, as exhibiting explicit proof both of his good sense and
unfeigned piety.'-(Dec. 18, 1784.) The allusion here is to the' Discourses
on the Prophecies concerning the First Establishment and Subsequent History
of Christianity,' delivered by Dr. Bagot as Warburtonian Lecturer in I780.
The Rev. Walter Bagot, an elder brother of the Bishop, was one of
Cowper's correspondents; and to him the latter wrote (Jan. 15, 1786),
'When I can hear of the rest of the bishops, that they preach and live
as your brother does, I will think more respectfnlly of them than I feel
inclined to do at present.' Cp. letter to W. Bagot, Nov. 9, I785.
11. 436-53. 'Connexions formed at school are said to be lasting, often
beneficial. There are two or three stories of this kind upon record, which
would not be so constantly cited as they are, whenever this subject happens
to be mentioned, if the chronicle that preserves their remembrance had many
besides them to boast of. For my own part I found such friendships, though
warm enough in their commencement, surprisingly liable to extinction; and
of seven or eight whom I had selected for intimates, out of about three
hundred, in ten years' time not one was left me.'-To Unwin, Oct. 5, i780.
1. 500. yachin and Boaz;-the names given to the two pillars of brass, set
up in tbe porch of King Solomon's Temple. See I Kings vii. 15-22.
1. 508. Pope's Essay on Man, Epistle iii. 304.
T 2




276


MINOR POEMS.


1. 542. Vestris;-see note in Vol. i., on Conversation, 1. 58.
11. 555-76. ' At eight or nine years of age the boy goes to school. Fron
that moment he becomes a stranger in his father's house. Year after year
he feels himself more and more detached from his parents, till at last he is so
effectually weaned from the connexion, as to find himself happier anywhere
than in their company.'-To Unwin, Sept. 17, 1780.
EPISTLE TO HILL.
Poems, 1785, i. 285.
Written in the middle of Nov. I784. 'I wrote it on Wednesday last;
a tribute so due that I must have disgraced myself had I not paid it. He
ever serves me in all that he can, though he has not seen me these
twenty years.'-To Unwin, Nov. 20, 1784. Hill was Cowper's senior at
Westminster. He was an attorney in Great Queen Street, a man of much
quiet humour, but of regular habits and close application to business: and
through Cowper's introduction he afterwards became secretary to Lord
Chancellor Thurlow. He and the Poet were fellow-members of the Nonsense
Club (cp. Life, p. xv., and letter to Hill, June 9, 1785); and Hill was the
kind and efficient manager of all Cowper's pecuniary affairs throughout
his life. He survived the Poet, and died at an advanced age.
ODE TO APOLLO.
Poems, 1794, ii. 350.
THE FAITHFUL BIRD.
Poems, I794, ii. 359. The last verse is given as it stands in ed. I808.
PAIRING TIME ANTICIPATED.
Poems, I794, ii. 36I.
1. t. Rousseau;-' It was one of the whimsical speculations of this philosopher, that all fables which ascribe reason and speech to animals should be
withheld from children, as being only vehicles of deception. But what child
was ever deceived by them, or can be, against the evidence of his sense?'-C.
Jean Jacques Rousseau was born at Geneva in 1712, and died in 1778.
THE NEEDLESS ALARM.
Poems, 1794, ii. 365.
II. 3, 36. Kilwick and Dinglederry;-'Two woods belonging to John
Throckmorton, Esq.'-C.




MINOR POEMS.


THE YEARLY DISTRESS.
Poems, 1803, i. 257.
The Rev. W. Cawthorne Unwin, having been educated at the Charterhouse,
and at Christ's College, Cambridge, became Rector of Stock-cum-RamsdenBelhouse, in Essex. While on a tour in the south of England, with
Mr. Henry Thornton (a son of the philanthropic John Thornton), he was
seized with typhus fever, of which he died at Winchester, Nov. 29, 1786;
leaving a widow and three young children. He was buried in Winchester
Cathedral.
GRATITUDE.
Hayley, I803, ii. 266.
Written in I786, when Lady Hesketh furnished Weston Lodge for
Cowper. See Life.
1. 40. Mulciber;- another name for Vulcan, the divine smith; probably derived from Lat. mulcere, ' to soften,' in allusion to the effects of fire in melting
metal.
THE POET'S NEW YEAR'S GIFT.
Poems, 1794, ii. 348.
Written for Jan. I, 1788: Mrs., afterwards Lady, Throckmorton was
Maria, daughter of Thomas Gifford, Esq., of Chillington.  ' This morning
I sent to the Hall a copy of verses entitled The Wish, or The Poet's New
Year's Gift. Their kindness is so great, and they seize with such eagerness
every opportunity of doing all they think will please us, that I held myself
almost in duty bound to treat them with this stroke of my profession.'-To
Lady Hesketh, Jan. I, I788.
THE NEGRO'S COMPLAINT.
This and the two following poems were written in March I788, to be
sung to popular airs as street ballads. They were published in the Poems,
1803, i. pp. 31I, 317. These songs, written at the solicitation of General
Cowper, were not successful among the class of persons for whom they were
intended. They were written under protest; as the subject ' seemed to offer
only images of horror, which could by no means be accommodated to the style
of that sort of composition.'-To Gen. Cowper (S. iv. 8). ' I have been twice
or thrice assailed with entreaties to write a poem [on the Slave-trade]. But
I felt myself so much hurt in my spirits the moment I entered on the con



278


MINOR POEMS.


templation of it, that I have determined absolutely to have nothing more to
do with it. There are some scenes of horror, on which my imagination call
dwell, not without some complacency. But then they are such scenes as
God, not man, produces. In earthquakes, high winds, tempestuous seas,
there is the grand as well as the terrible. But when man is active to disturb,
there is such meanness in the design, and such cruelty in the execution, that
I both hate and despise the whole operation, and feel it a degradation of
poetry to employ her in the description of it.'-To Bagot, June 17, 1788.
THE MORNING DREAM.
The Poet tells General Cowper, that this ballad (which was to have been
sung to the air of ' Tweedside') is 'that which appeared to himself the best'
of the series (S. iv. 8): cp. letter to Lady Hesketh, June 27, 1788. On the
subject of the slave-trade, see note on The Task, ii. 42.
MRS. MONTAGU'S FEATHER HANGINGS.
These adorned the walls of the room in which Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu
(born 1720, died 1800) held her famous 'Blue Stocking Club,' at Montagu
House, Portman Square. This Club, to which both ladies and gentlemen
were admitted, is said to have been so named because one of its regular
members, Mr. Benjamin Stillingfleet, used to appear there in his ordinary
blue worsted stockings. Mrs. Montagu is also well known for having instituted an annual dinner on May-day to the chimney-sweeps of London, in consequence of a relative of hers having been discovered as a chimney-sweep,
after running away from Westminster School. She was the daughter of
Mr. Robinson, of West Layton, Yorkshire, and was married in 1742 to Edward
Montagu, of Denton Hall in Northumberland, M.P., who died in 1775. She
assisted George Lord Lyttelton in his Dialogues of the Dead, 1765; and in
1769 published her 'Essay on the Genius and Writings of Shakspeare, with
Remarks on the Misrepresentations of Voltaire.' Of this work Cowper
wrote,-' I no longer wonder that Mrs. Montagu stands at the head of all that
is called learned, and that every critic vails his bonnet to her superior judgment.  The learning, the good sense, the sound judgment and wit displayed
in it, fully justify not only my compliment, but all compliments that either
have been already paid to her talents, or shall be paid hereafter.'-To Lady
Hesketh, May 27, 1788. The poem was first printed in the Gentleman's
Magazine for June i788, and was included in Poems 1803, i. 263; having
been written in May, 1788, at the request of Lady Hesketh.  She had
sent the Poet a note received from Mrs. Montagu; and he replied, 'In
the style of the lady's note to you, I can easily perceive a smatch of her




MINOR POEMS.


279


character. Neither men nor women write with such neatness of expression,
who have not given a good deal of attention to language, and qualified
themselves by study.' (May 12, I788.)
THE DOG AND THE WATER-LILY.
Written in June, 1788, First printed in a separate form, with the ' Lines on
the Receipt of my Mother's Picture,' in 1798; and included in Poems, 1799,
ii. 295. The Poet tells the story in prose to Lady Hesketh, June 27, I788.
1. 7. Nymphs; —'Sir Robert Gunning's daughters.'-C. These ladies,
daughters of Sir Robert first Baronet of Horton, Northumberland, were
Charlotte, who was married in 1790 to the Hon. Stephen Digby; and Barbara,
who became the wife of Major-General Ross, in 1795.
MRS. THROCKMORTON'S BULLFINCH.
Written in Sept. I788: published in Poems, I794, ii. 343.
1. 3. Maria;-Mrs. Throckmorton. See note on the Poet's New Year's
Gift.
ON THE RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE.
Written in Feb. i790. First printed in a separate form, with 'The Dog
and the Water-Lily,' in I798; and included in the Poems of the same year,
i. 244.
The Poet's mother was Anne, daughter of Roger Donne of Ludham Hall,
Norfolk, Esq., by Katherine, daughter of Mr. Bruin Clench. She was born
at Ludham, Oct. 14, I703, and died at Berkhampstead, Nov. 13, I737.
Mrs. Bodham, who sent the picture, was her niece; being third daughter of
the Rev. Roger Donne, Rector of Catfield, Norfolk, by his second wife
Harriet-Judith, daughter of the Rev. Peter Rival. She was born in 1748,
and was married in 1771 to the Rev. Thomas Bodham, Rector of Mattishall,
Norfolk.
The picture, an original in oils by Heines, reached Cowper at Weston,
Feb. 25, I790. On the 27th, he wrote to Mrs. Bodham,-'The world
could not have furnished you with a present so acceptable to me... I
viewed it with a trepidation of nerves and spirits somewhat akin to what I
should have felt, had the dear original presented herself to my embraces. I
kissed it, and hung it where it is the last object that I see at night, and the
first on which I open my eyes in the morning. She died when I completed
my sixth year; yet I remember her well, and can bear ocular witness of the
fidelity of the copy.' (S. i. 437.)




280


MINOR POEMS.


1. 38. Cp. Task, v. 655, 876. Caesar, Bell. Gall. iii. 18, 'Fere libenter
homines quod volunt credunt;' Bell. Civ. ii. 7, 'Nam quae volumus, et
credimus libenter: et quae sentimus ipsi, reliquos sentire speramus.' See
2 Henry IV, iv. 4 -'Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought.'
Young, Night Thoughts, ii. 433 -' So prone our hearts to whisper what we wish;'
and the same, vii. I31I' What ardently we wish, we soon believe.'
1. 53. Pastoral house;-the Rectory of Great Berkhampstead, Hertfordshire, of which parish the Poet's father was ' Pastor.'
1 97. ' Garth.'-C. The line is not accurately quoted. It stands thus
(Dispensary, canto 3)' Where billows never break, nor tempests roar.'
I. Io8. Dr. John Johnson informs us that Mrs. Cowper's descent was
'through the families of Hippisley of Throughly in Sussex, and Pellet of
Bolney in the same county, from the several noble houses of West, Knollys,
Carey, Boleyne, Howard, and Mowbray; and so by four different lines from
Henry III, King of England.' The pedigree, as certified by Cowper and
others of the family, is registered in the College of Arms.
JUDGMENT OF THE POETS.
Written in May, i791: published by Hayley, 1803, i. 405.
1. I. Two nymphs;-the months of May and June. ' We have blooming
scenes under wintry skies, and with icy blasts to fan them.'-To Mr.
Buchanan, May 1. 'Oh! what a month of May this has been! Let
never poet, English poet at least, give himself to the praise of May again.'To Y. Johnson, May 23, 1791.
YARDLEY OAK.
Written in 1791, but left unfinished amongst the Poet's MSS., from which
it was printed by Hayley, x803, iii. 409. Cowper had left this memorandum
on his MS.:
'Yardley Oak, in Girth, Feet 22, Inches 6i:
The Oak at Yardley Lodge, Feet 28, Inches 5.'
The former (which was sound in 1791) stands about five miles from
Weston, in an open space in Yardley Chase, belonging to the Marquess of
Northampton. It is in the Park Farm, near the meeting of the three
counties, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and Northamptonshire. The latter
was a pollard, decayed and almost hollow; and stood just beyond Kilwick
and Dinglederry.  'Since your departure I have twice visited the oak, and




MINOR POEMS.


28i


with an intention to push my enquiries a mile beyond, where it seems I
should have found another oak, much larger and more respectable than the
former... This latter oak has been known by the name of Judith for
many ages, and is said to have been an oak at the time of the Conquest.'To Rose, Sept. I, 1788. It is thought that the tree was so named after the
Conqueror's niece Judith, who received vast lands in the counties of Northampton and Huntingdon in dower, on her marriage with Earl Waltheof.
She had eighty-eight manors in Northamptonshire, including a portion of
Yardley.
Mr. Loudon has an account of Yardley Oak in his Arboretum, 1838, iii.
p. 1765. He gives the girth (from measurements made at that date) at one
foot above the ground, as 30 feet, 6 inches. The stem then leant so much
to the south, as to admit of a person walking up it with very little aid from
the hands; and it had three huge branches, wholly devoid of bark.  Mr.
J. A. Picton writes, in Notes and Queries for Dec. 13, 1873: ' The Yardley
Oak has now few branches, scantily spreading from a huge hollow trunk;
and it is unfortunately dying, having been much injured in past years by the
deeply-graven names of persons desirous to inform us of their visit' (Fourth
Ser., xii. 481).
1. 4I. Dodona was a city of Epirus, at the foot of Mount Tomaos; where
was the most ancient oracle in Greece, in connexion with a temple dedicated
to Zeus. This oracle, said to have existed in the days of Deucalion, and
certainly anterior to the Trojan War, was believed to utter its responses
through the sacred oak.
1. 99. 'Knee-timber is found in the crooked arms of oak; which, by
reason of their distortion, are easily adjusted to the angle formed where the
deck and the ship's sides meet.'-C. Bacon says, in his I3th Essay: ' Such
dispositions [Misanthropi] are the very errours of Human Nature: and yet
they are the fittest timber to make great Politiques of:-like to knee timber,
that is good for ships, that are ordained to be tossed; but not for building
houses, that shall stand firm.'
THE RETIRED CAT.
Hayley, I803, i. 253. Written in I791.
The Poet had written to Lady Hesketh, Nov. IO, I 787, ' I have a kitten,
my dear, the drollest of all creatures that ever wore a cat's skin. Her
gambols are not to be described, and would be incredible, if they could.
In point of size she is likely to be a kitten always, being exceeding small
of her age; but time, I suppose, that spoils everything, will make her also
a cat. You will see her, I hope, before that melancholy period shall arrive;
for no wisdom that she may gain by experience and reflection hereafter
will compensate the loss of her present hilarity. She is dressed in a tortoiseshell suit.'




282


MINOR POEMS.


EPITAPH ON A REDBREAST.
Written in March 1792; published by Dr. J. Johnson, 1815, iii. 287.
' Miss Sally Hurdis' was sister of the Rev. James Hurdis, Professor of
Poetry at Oxford, who was one of Cowper's correspondents, 1791-3; and
whom he met while on a visit to Hayley at Eartham in 1792.
TO MRS. UNWIN.
Written in May 1793; published by Hayley, 1803, ii. 43.
This is the best specimen of Cowper's sonnets.
A TALE.
Hayley, 1803, ii. 299. Written in June, I793.
Founded on the following extract from the Buckinghamshire Herald for
June I, 1793:-' Glasgow, May 23. In a block or pulley near the head of
the mast of a gabeot, now lying at Broomielaw, there is a chaffinch's nest
and four eggs. The nest was built while the vessel lay at Greenock and was
followed thither by both birds. Though the block was occasionally lowered
for the inspection of the curious, the birds have not forsaken the nest. The
cock, however, visits the nest but seldom; while the hen never leaves it but
when she descends to the hull for food.'
TO MARY.
Hayley, 1803, ii. 194. Written in the autumn of I793.
This was Cowper's last original poem at Weston. Mary Unwin, daughter
of Mr. Cawthorne of Ely, and widow of the Rev. Morley Unwin of
Huntingdon, died at East Dereham in Norfolk, Dec. 17, 1796, at the age of
72; and was buried in the North Aisle of Dereham Church. She was, at
the time when this Poem was written, in that state of second childishness
of mind, and utter helplessness of body, in which she continued from her
second attack of paralysis, in Sept. 1792, till the time of her death.
1. I. This reference to the year 1773 seems to confirm Mr. Newton's
statement, that the poet's projected marriage with Mrs. Unwin was prevented
by the derangement which he suffered in that year. See Life, p. xxiv.
1. o10. When Lady Hesketh visited Olney in June, i786, she wrote thus to
her sister, Theodora Jane Cowper, respecting Mrs. Unwin (then in her sixtysecond year)-' Her constant employment is knitting stockings, which she
does with the finest needles I ever saw, and very nice they are-the stockings,




MINOR POEMS.                          283
I mean. Our cousin has not for many years worn any other than those of
her manufacture. She knits silk, cotton, and worsted. She sits knitting on
one side of the table, in her spectacles; and he on the other, reading to her
(when he is not employed in writing) in his.'
THE CASTAWAY.
HIayley, I803, ii. 2T4. Written March 20, 1799.
This poem was founded on an incident recounted in Anson's Voyages.
'It is (says Southey) the last original piece that Cowper composed; and, all
circumstances considered, one of the most affecting that ever was composed.'
(S. ii. 149.)




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