Come forth, come forth, prove all the numbers then, That make perfection up, and may absolve you men. But show thy winding ways and arts, Those softer circles are the young man's heaven, And there more orbs and planets are than seven. To know whose motion As worthy of youth's study, as devotion. Come forth, come forth! prove all the time will gain, For Nature bids the best, and never bade in vain. BEN JONSON. L'ALLEGRO. HENCE, loathed Melancholy. Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born! In Stygian cave forlorn, 'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy, Find out some uncouth cell, Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous wings, And the night-raven sings; There under ebon shades, and lowbrow'd rocks, As ragged as thy locks, In dark Cimmerian desert ever But come, thou Goddess fair and free, Zephyr with Aurora playing, And fresh-blown roses washed in dew, Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee Jest, and youthful Jollity, Quips, and Cranks, and wanton Wiles, Nods, and Becks, and wreathed Such as hang on Hebe's cheek, And if I give thee honor due, Cheerly rouse the slumbering morn, Some time walking, not unseen, While the ploughman near at hand Whilst the landscape round it measures; Russet lawns, and fallows gray, Where the nibbling flocks do stray; Mountains, on whose barren breast The laboring clouds do often rest; Meadows trim with daisies pied, Shallow brooks, and rivers wide; Towers and battlements it sees And then in haste her bow'r she leaves, With Thestylis to bind the sheaves; To the tann'd haycock in the mead. On a sunshine holiday, His shadowy flail hath thresh'd the Of wit, or arms, while both contend To win her grace whom all commend. There let Hymen oft appear In saffron robe, with taper clear, Warble his native wood-notes wild. The melting voice through mazes running, Untwisting all the chains that tie From golden slumber on a bed Of Pluto, to have quite set free These delights if thou canst give, Mirth, with thee I mean to live. MILTON. Unutterable love. Sound needed none, Nor any voice of joy; his spirit drank The spectacle; sensation, soul, and form All melted into him; they swallowed up His animal being; in them did he live, And by them did he live; they were his life. In such access of mind, in such high hour Of visitation from the living God, Thought was not; in enjoyment it expired. No thanks he breathed, he proffered no request; Rapt into still communion that transcends The imperfect offices of prayer and praise, His mind was a thanksgiving to the power That made him; it was blessedness and love. WORDSWORTH. DOVER CLIFFS. COME on, sir; here's the place:stand still. - How fearful And dizzy 'tis, to cast one's eye so low! The crows and choughs, that wing the midway air, Show scarce so gross as beetles: half way down Hangs one that gathers samphire; dreadful trade! Methinks he seems no bigger than his head: The fishermen, that walk upon the beach, Appear like mice; and yond' tall anchoring bark Diminish'd to her cock; her cock, a buoy Almost too small for sight: the murmuring surge, That on the unnumber'd idle pebbles chafes, Cannot be heard so high:- I'll look |