The blackbird amid leafy trees,
The lark above the hill,
Let loose their carols when they please, Are quiet when they will.
“With Nature never do they wage
A foolish strife; they see
A happy youth, and their old age
Is beautiful and free:
"But we are pressed by heavy laws;
And often, glad no more,
We wear a face of joy, because
We have been glad of
"If there be one who need bemoan
His kindred laid in earth,
The household hearts that were his own, It is the man of mirth.
'My days, my Friend, are almost gone;
My life has been approved,
And many love me; but by none
Am I enough beloved."
"Now both himself and me he wrongs,
The man who thus complains!
I live and sing my idle songs
Upon these happy plains;
"And, Matthew, for thy children dead,
I'll be a son to thee!"
At this he grasped my hand, and said.
"Alas! that cannot be."
We rose up from the fountain-side;
And down the smooth descent
Of the green sheep-track did we glide;
And through the wood we went ;
And, ere we came to Leonard's rock,
He sang those witty rhymes
About the crazy old church-clock.
And the bewildered chimes.
I AM not one who much or oft delight
To season my fireside with personal talk, –
Of friends, who live within an easy walk,
Or neighbors, daily, weekly, in my sight:
And, for my chance-acquaintance, ladies bright,
Sons, mothers, maidens withering on the stalk,
These all wear out of me, like Forms, with chalk
Painted on rich men's floors, for one feast-night.
Better than such discourse doth silence long,
Long, barren silence, square with my desire;
To sit without emotion, hope, or aim,
In the loved presence of my cottage-fire,
And listen to the flapping of the flame,
Or kettle whispering its faint undersong.
"Yet life," you say, "is life; we have seen and see, And with a living pleasure we describe;
And fits of sprightly malice do but bribe
The languid mind into activity.
Sound sense, and love itself, and mirth and glee,
Are fostered by the comment and the gibe."
Even be it so yet still among your tribe,
Our daily world's true Worldlings, rank not me!
Children are blest, and powerful; their world lies
More justly balanced; partly at their feet,
And part far from them: -- sweetest melodies
Are those that are by distance made more sweet;
Whose mind is but the mind of his own eyes,
He is a Slave; the meanest we can meet !
and as far as we can go
We may find pleasure: wilderness and wood,
Blank ocean and mere sky, support that mood
Which with the lofty sanctifies the low.
Dreams, books, are each a world; and books, we know,
Are a substantial world, both pure and good:
Round these, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood,
Our pastime and our happiness will grow.
There find I personal themes, a plenteous store,
Matter wherein right voluble I am,
To which I listen with a ready ear;
Two shall be named, preeminently dear, -
The gentle Lady married to the Moor,
And heavenly Una with her milk-white Lamb.
Nor can I not believe but that hereby
Great gains are mine; for thus I live remote
From evil-speaking; rancor, never sought,
Comes to me not; malignant truth, or lie.
Hence have I genial seasons, hence have I
Smooth passions, smooth discourses, and joyous
thought:
And thus from day to day my little boat
Rocks in its harbor, lodging peaceable.
Blessings be with them, and eternal praise,
Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler cares, -
The Poets, who on earth have made us heirs
Of truth and pure delight by heavenly lays!
Oh! might ny name be numbered among theirs,
Then gladly would I end my mortal days.
ILLUSTRATED BOOKS AND NEWSPAPERS.
DISCOURSE was deemed Man's noblest attribute,
And written words the glory of his hand;
Then followed Printing with enlarged command
For thought, dominion vast and absolute
For spreading truth, and making love expand.
Now prose and verse sunk into disrepute
Must lackey a dumb Art that best can suit
The taste of this once-intellectual Land.
A backward movement surely have we here
From manhood, back to childhood: for the age,
Back towards caverned life's first rude caree".
Avaunt this vile abuse of pictured page!
Must eyes be all in all, the tongue and ear
Nothing? Heaven keep us from a lower stage!
Composed while we were laboring together in his pleasureground.
SPADE! with which Wilkinson hath tilled his lands, And shaped these pleasant walks by Emont's side.
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