Lulled in the countless chambers of the brain, The subtle, quick vibrations as they play; At once illumined when the cloud is past. Survey the globe, each ruder realm explore; From Reason's faintest ray to NEWTON soar. What different spheres to human bliss assigned! What slow gradations in the scale of mind! Yet mark in each these mystic wonders wrought; Oh mark the sleepless energies of thought! * Namque illic posuit solium, et sua templa sacravit The adventurous boy, that asks his little share, And hies from home with many a gossip's prayer, Turns on the neighbouring hill, once more to see The dear abode of peace and privacy; And as he turns, the thatch among the trees, The smoke's blue wreaths ascending with the breeze, And oft he looks and weeps, and looks again. So, when the mild TUPIA dared explore Arts yet untaught, and worlds unknown before, And, with the sons of Science, wooed the gale That, rising, swelled their strange expanse of sail; So, when he breathed his firm yet fond adieu, Borne from his leafy hut, his carved canoe, And all his soul best loved-such tears he shed, While each soft scene of summer-beauty fled. Long o'er the wave a wistful look he cast, Long watched the streaming signal from the mast; Till twilight's dewy tints deceived his eye, And fairy-forests fringed the evening-sky. So Scotia's Queen, as slowly dawned the day, Rose on her couch and gazed her soul away. Her eyes had blessed the beacon's glimmering height, That faintly tipt the feathery surge with light; But now the morn with orient hues pourtrayed Each castled cliff and brown monastic shade: All touched the talisman's resistless spring, And lo, what busy tribes were instant on the wing! Thus kindred objects kindred thoughts inspire, As summer-clouds flash forth electric fire. And hence this spot gives back the joys of youth, D When exile wore his blooming years away, When reason, justice, vainly urged his cause, Glad to return, tho' Hope could grant no more, 'Twas ever thus. Young AMMON, when he sought Sate at the helm himself. No meaner hand Steered thro' the waves; and, when he struck the land, Such in his soul the ardour to explore, PELIDES-like, he leaped the first ashore. 'Twas ever thus. As now at VIRGIL's tomb In Rome's great forum, who but hears him roll And hence that calm delight the portrait gives: We gaze on every feature till it lives! Still the fond lover sees the absent maid; What tho' the iron school of War erase The intrepid Swiss, who guards a foreign shore, Condemned to climb his mountain-cliffs no more, If chance he hears the song so sweet, so wild, His heart would spring to hear it when a child, Melts at the long-lost scenes that round him rise, And sinks a martyr to repentant sighs. Ask not if courts or camps dissolve the charm: Say why VESPASIAN loved his Sabine farm; |