Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

george, lorD LYTTELTON.—SAMUEL JOHNSON.

177

THE ONLY LIGHT.

Christ, whose glory fills the skies,
Christ, the true, the only Light,
Sun of Righteousness, arise,

Triumph o'er the shades of night! Day-spring from on high, be near! Day-star, in my heart appear!

Dark and cheerless is the morn
Unaccompanied by thee;
Joyless is the day's return

Till thy mercy's beams I see;
Till they inward light impart,
Glad my eyes and warm my heart.

Visit then this soul of mine,
Pierce the gloom of sin and grief!
Fill me, Radiancy Divine,

Scatter all my unbelief!
More and more thyself display,
Shining to the perfect day.

George, Lord Lyttelton.

Lyttelton (1709–1773), a native of Hagley, and the son of a baronet, was educated at Oxford, and at nineteen travelled on the Continent. He is one of the poets admitted into Aiken's Collection; but the most buoyant of his productions is the one little song which we subjoin.

TELL ME, MY HEART.

When Delia on the plain appears,
Awed by a thousand tender fears,
I would approach, but dare not move:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

Whene'er she speaks, my ravished ear
No other voice but hers can hear,
No other wit but hers approve :
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

If she some other youth commend,
Though I was once his fondest friend,
His instant enemy I prove:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

When she is absent, I no more
Delight in all that pleased before,
The clearest spring, the shadiest grove:-
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

When, fond of power, of beauty vain, Her nets she spread for every swain, I strove to hate, but vainly strove :Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

Samuel Johnson.

The son of a poor Lichfield bookseller, Johnson (17091784) fought his way nobly to literary eminence against poverty, disease, and adverse fortune. At nineteen he went to Oxford, where he stayed three years, and got a reputation for his Latin verses; but his father becoming insolvent, he had to leave without taking a degree. In 1736 he married Mrs. Porter, a widow twenty years older than himself. To her he showed a true attachment as long as she lived. In 1738 he began his career in London with a poem upon "London," which drew from Pope the remark: "The author, whoever he is, will not long be concealed." For ten years more Johnson battled on, doing job work for Cave, publisher of the Gentleman's Magazine; and at the age of forty published his "Vanity of Human Wishes," a poem in imitation of the Tenth Satire of Juvenal. The following year appeared "The Rambler." His "Rasselas" was written to pay the expenses of his mother's funeral. His "Dictionary" occupied eight years of his life. The last of his literary labors was "The Lives of the Poets." Of this almost forgotten work it has been remarked: "Some of his dwarfs are giants; many of his giauts have dwindled into dwarfs." He could not appreciate Milton or Gray; but he gave importance to versifiers whose very

names are unfamiliar to the modern reader.

In 1762 the king conferred on Johnson a pension of £300 a year, partly, it may be inferred, in consequence of his political services; for he wrote a pamphlet entitled "Taxation no Tyranny," to show that Samuel Adams, George Washington, and the rest of the American malcontents ought to pay their taxes on tea, etc., without grumbling. Henceforth he had a comparatively easy time of it, and the Johnson of this period is pretty well known. He is as near to us as it is in the power of writing to place any man. Everything about him-his coat, his wig, his figure, his face, his scrofula, his St. Vitus's dance, his rolling walk, his blinking eye; the "flushed face, and the veins swollen on his broad forehead," outward signs which too clearly marked his approbation of his dinner; his insatiable appetite for fishsauce and veal-pie with plums, his thirst for tea, his trick of touching the posts as he walked, and his mysterious practice of treasuring up scraps of orange-peel; his morning slumbers, his midnight disputations, his contortions, his mutterings, his gruntings, his puffings; his vigorous, acute, and ready eloquence; his sarcastic wit, his vehemence, his insolence, his fits of tempestuous rage, his queer inmates, shielded by his kindness-old Mr. Levett and blind Mrs. Williams, the cat Hodge, and the negro Frank-all are as familiar to us as the objects by which we have been surrounded from childhood.

For all this knowledge we are indebted to James Boswell, Esquire," a Scottish advocate, of shallow brain but

imperturbable conceit, the thickness of whose mental skin enabled him to enjoy the great Englishman's society, in spite of sneers and insults hurled by day and night at his empty head. Not a perfect vacuum, however, was that head; for one fixed idea possessed it-admiration of Samuel Johnson, and the resolve to lose no words that fell from his idolized lips. To this fussy, foolish man, the butt and buffoon of the distinguished society into which he had pushed himself, we owe a book which is justly held to be the best biography in the English language."

Johnson's mortal remains were buried in Westminster Abbey, near the foot of Shakspeare's monument, and close to the grave of Garrick.

CHARLES XII. OF SWEDEN.

On what foundation stands the warrior's pride,
How just his hopes, let Swedish Charles' decide:
A frame of adamant, a soul of fire,

No dangers fright him, and no labors tire;
O'er love, o'er fear, extends his wide domain,
Unconquered lord of pleasure and of pain;
No joys to him pacific sceptres yield,

War sounds the trump, he rushes to the field;
Behold, surrounding kings their powers combine,
And one capitulate, and one resign;

Peace courts his hand, but spreads her charms in vain;

"Think nothing gained," he cries, "till naught remain;

On Moscow's walls till Gothic standards fly,
And all be mine beneath the polar sky."
The march begins in military state,
And nations on his eye suspended wait;
Stern Famine guards the solitary coast,
And Winter barricades the realms of frost;
He comes, nor want nor cold his course delay:-
Hide, blushing Glory, hide Pultowa's day!
The vanquished hero leaves his broken bands,
And shows his miserics in distant lands;
Condemned a needy supplicant to wait;
While ladies interpose, and slaves debate.
But did not chance at length her error mend?
Did no subverted empire mark his end?
Did rival monarchs give the fatal wound?
Or hostile millions press him to the ground?
His fall was destined to a barren strand,
A petty fortress, and a dubious hand:

He left the name, at which the world grew pale,
To point a moral, or adorn a tale.

1 Charles XII. of Sweden, defeated at the battle of Pultowa, in July, 1709, was shot at Frederickshall, on the coast of Norway, in December, 1718.

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

SAMUEL JOHNSON.-RICHARD GLOVER.

CARDINAL WOLSEY.

FROM THE VANITY OF HUMAN WISHES."

In full-blown dignity see Wolsey stand,
Law in his voice, and fortune in his hand:
To him the church, the realm, their powers consigu,
Through him the rays of regal bounty shine,
Turned by his nod the stream of honor flows,
His smile alone security bestows:

Still to new heights his restless wishes tower,
Claim leads to claim, and power advances power:
Till conquest unresisted ceased to please,
And rights submitted, left him none to seize.
At length his sovereign frowns-the train of state
Mark the keen glance, and watch the sign to hate.
Where'er he turns, he meets a stranger's eye,
His suppliants scorn him, and his followers fly:
Now drops at once the pride of awful state,
The golden canopy, the glittering plate,
The regal palace, the luxurious board,
The liveried army, and the menial lord.
With age, with cares, with maladies oppressed,
He seeks a refuge of monastic rest;
Grief aids disease, remembered folly stings,
And his last sighs reproach the faith of kings.
Speak thou, whose thoughts at humble peace
repine,

Shall Wolsey's wealth, with Wolsey's end, be thine?
Or liv'st thou now, with safer pride content,
The wisest justice on the banks of Trent?
For why did Wolsey, near the steeps of fate,
On weak foundations raise the enormous weight?
Why but to sink beneath misfortune's blow,
With louder ruin to the gulfs below?

179

Yet when the sense of sacred presence fires,
And strong devotion to the skies aspires,
Pour forth thy fervors for a healthful mind,
Obedient passions, and a will resigned;
For love, which scarce collective man can fill;
For patience, sovereign o'er transmuted ill;
For faith, that panting for a happier seat,
Counts death kind Nature's signal of retreat :
These goods for man the laws of Heaven ordain,
These goods he grants, who grants the power to gain;
With these celestial Wisdom calms the mind,
And makes the happiness she does not find.

ON CLAUDE PHILLIPS, AN ITINERANT
MUSICIAN IN WALES.

Phillips! whose touch harmonious could remove
The pangs of guilty power and hapless love,
Rest here, distressed by poverty no more,
Find here that calm thou gavest so oft before;
Sleep undisturbed within this peaceful shrine,
Till angels wake thee with a note like thine.

Richard Glover.

Glover (1712-1785), the son of a London merchant, and himself a merchant, published two elaborate poems in blank verse-"Leonidas," and "The Athenaid." He was a member of Parliament for several years, and was esteemed eloquent, intrepid, and incorruptible. He wrote two or three tragedies, but they were not successful on the stage. He edited the poems of Matthew Green, and seems to have appreciated the peculiar genius of that neglected poct. The ballad which we publish from Glover's pen is likely to outlast all his epics and plays.

NOR DEEM RELIGION VAIN.

Where, then, shall Hope and Fear their objects find?

Must dull suspense corrupt the stagnant mind?
Must helpless man, in ignorance sedate,
Roll darkling down the torrent of his fate?
Must no dislike alarm, no wishes rise,
No cries invoke the mercies of the skies?
Inquirer, cease; petitions yet remain

Which Heaven may hear, nor deem religion vain.
Still raise for good the supplicating voice,
But leave to Heaven the measure and the choice.
Safe in his power, whose eyes discern afar
The secret ambush of a specious prayer,
Implore his aid, in his decisions rest,
Secure whate'er he gives, he gives the best.

[ocr errors]

ADMIRAL HOSIER'S GHOST.

In 1727 the English admiral, Hosier, blockaded Porto-Bello with twenty ships, but was not allowed to attack it, war not having actually broken out between England and Spain; and a peace being patched up, his squadron was withdrawn. In 1740, Admiral Vernon (after whom Washington's "Mount Vernon was named) took Porto-Bello with six ships. It was apparently a very creditable exploit; but Vernon being an enemy of Walpole's, and a member of the Opposition, it was glorified by them beyond its merits. Glover is here the mouth-piece of the Opposition, who, while they exalted Vernon, affected to pity Hosier, who had died, as they declared, of a broken heart, and of whose losses by disease during the blockade they did not fail to make the most.

As near Porto-Bello lying,

On the gently swelling flood,
At midnight, with streamers flying,
Our triumphant navy rode;

[blocks in formation]

WILLIAM SHENSTONE.

pects, to diversify his surface, to entangle his walks, and to wind his waters." Descriptions of the Leasowes have been written by Dodsley and Goldsmith. The property was altogether not worth more than £300 per annum, and Shenstone had devoted so much of his means to external embellishment, that he had to live in a dilapidated house hardly rain-proof. He had wasted his substance in temples, inscriptions, and artificial walks. At every turn there was a bust or a seat with an inscription.

Among the inscriptions, that to Miss Dolman is memorable because of a felicitous sentiment in Latin, often quoted: "Peramabili suæ consobrina M. D. Ah! Maria! puellarum elegantissima! ab flore venustatis abrepta, vale! Heu quanto minus est cum reliquis versari, quam tui meminisse!" In English: "Sacred to the memory of a most amiable kinswoman, M. D. Ah! Maria! most elegant of nymphs! snatched from us in the bloom of beauty-ah! farewell! Alas! how much less precious is it to converse with others than to remember thee !"

Shenstone's highest effort is "The School-mistress," said to have been written at college in 1736. It is still read with pleasure. It is in imitation of Spenser, and "so delightfully quaint and ludicrous, yet true to nature, that it has all the force and vividness of a painting by Teniers or Wilkie." Of his other poems, comprising odes, elegies, and pastorals, few of them are likely to endure in the survival of the fittest.

FROM "THE SCHOOL-MISTRESS."

IN IMITATION OF SPENSER.

Ah me! full sorely is my heart forlorn, To think how modest worth neglected lies, While partial Fame doth with her blasts adorn Such deeds alone as pride and pomp disguise; Deeds of ill sort, and mischievous emprize: Lend me thy clarion, goddess! let me try To sound the praise of merit ere it dies, Such as I oft have chanced to espy Lost in the dreary shades of dull obscurity.

In every village marked with little spire, Embowered in trees, and hardly known to fame, There dwells, in lowly shades and mean attire, A matron old, whom we School-mistress name; Who boasts unruly brats with birch to tame; They grieven sore, in piteons durance pent, Awed by the power of this relentless dame, And ofttimes, on vagaries idly bent,

For unkempt hair, or task unconned, are sorely shent.

And all in sight doth rise a birchen-tree,
Which learning near her little dome did stow,
Whilom a twig of small regard to see,
Though now so wide its waving branches flow;
And work the simple vassals mickle woe;

1-1

[blocks in formation]
« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »