TO HIS MOTHER ON HER BIRTHDAY.
OH they were not in vain !-were not in vain!
Thy days of sorrow and thy hours of pain!
When, o'er the cradle of our tender years,
Rose the warm incense of a Mother's prayers.
Then it was sweet to mark the innocent smile
Play round the lip of infancy, the while
It viewed its parent's features,-to descry
The dawn of reason in its kindling eye,
And, o'er its little lips in rapture hung,
To catch the lispings of th' unfettered tongue.
These were thy pleasures then !-The infant breast
Soon the young flame of filial love confessed;
And, ere the mind that earliest flame approved,
Loved without knowing whom or what it loved.
Years have rolled on :-affection cannot tire;
Still glows her altar with the Vestal fire,
Shining more fixedly, more clearly bright,
While reason owns that nature taught aright.
Yes, dearest Mother! if thy tender eye
Gazed fondly o'er our helpless infancy,
And joyed in those imperfect signs to see
The first expressions of it's love to thee,
Wilt thou not now receive and now approve
The plainer tokens of more perfect love-
Love, which the world's best feelings far outvies,-
Binding in stronger, purer, happier ties,-
Reigning when other passions shall subside,-
Which time corrupts not, death cannot divide?
Thou hast, by mild instruction early given,
Bent our young footsteps on the road to heaven.
And now from realms of light beyond the grave,
Bursts the broad splendour o'er th' illumined wave;
Now the tossed bark upon life's stormy sea
Springs to its haven of eternity;
E'en now from fairer climes a purer gale
Pours its rich fragrance on the shattered sail.
Oh haste we on! 'till every trial cease
In perfect holiness and perfect peace :
Till in that world of life, and love, and bliss,
The cup shall satisfy, we taste in this.
West Bilney Lodge,
Feb. 13, 1825.
WHEN the wrung heart, with passionate regret,
Dwells upon joys too beautiful to last,
And o'er the fond remembrance lingers yet,
As if its dreaming could recall the past;
When fades the present from the wildered sight,
As musing memory shifts the fancied scene,
Till we can almost grasp the lost delight,
Feel as we felt, and be as we have been ;Feel-yes, a livelier, tenderer beauty springs
O'er the loved features of each happy day; For memory's touch, in bright profusion, brings All, all the joy, but steals the gloom away; When that we fondly loved, and now deplore,
Glides o'er the soul like moonlight o'er the sea,
And wears a smile, perchance, it never wore,
And seems a being it could never be ;
And when, at length, those rainbow-colours fade,
Which fancy's sunbeam on the past could throw,
When clouds and tears come hurrying on instead,
And we are left to certainty and woe ;-
Left but to find our rose-twined garland dead,
To see the future darken on our view,
To mourn those joyous days for ever fled,
And vainly madden o'er the long adieu ;
Oh, then we feel how empty and how vain,
Is human pleasure in its gayest dress;
We feel our sky but smiles to frown again,
And earth is not the home of happiness!
And then a sweet, pure light creeps trembling in,
Unlike romantic fancy's frolic ray,
Which seems unnoticed on the mind to win,
With the bright promise of a better day.
It is not Hope, at least, not that which says
That the loved past shall in the future live,
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