On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
E'en from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires.

For thee, who, mindful of th' unhonored dead,
Dost in those lines their artless tale relate,
If chance, by lonely Contemplation led,
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,

"

Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
"Oft have we seen him, at the peep of dawn,
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away,
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.

“There, at the foot of yonder nodding beech,
That wreathes its old fantastic root so high,
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

"Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,
Muttering his wayward fancies, he would rove;
Now drooping, woful, wan, like one forlorn,

Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless love.

"One morn I missed him on the accustomed hill, Along the heath, and near his favorite tree; Another came, nor yet beside the rill,

Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood, was he:

"The next, with dirges due, in sad array,

Slow through the churchway-path we saw him borne. Approach, and read (for thou canst read) the lay Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn:

THE EPITAPH.

Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth
A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown:
Fair Science frowned not on his humble birth,
And Melancholy marked him for her own.

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere;
Heaven did a recompense as largely send:

He gave to misery all he had - a tear;

He gained from Heaven - 'twas all he wished a friend.

No further seek his merits to disclose,

Or draw his frailties from their dread abode (There they alike in trembling hope repose), The bosom of his Father and his God.

234. ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF Eton College.

Ye distant spires!'ye antique towers!
That crown the watery glade
Where grateful Science still adores
Her Henry's holy shade;

And ye that from the stately brow

Of Windsor's heights th' expanse below

Of grove, of lawn, of mead survey,

Whose turf, whose shade, whose flowers among
Wanders the hoary Thames along

His silver-winding way:

Ah, happy hills! ah, pleasing shade!

Ah, fields beloved in vain!

Where once my careless childhood strayed,

A stranger yet to pain!

I feel the gales that from ye blow

A momentary bliss bestow,

As, waving fresh their gladsome wing,
My weary soul they seem to soothe,
And, redolent of joy and youth,

To breathe a second spring.

Say, father Thames! for thou hast seen
Full many a sprightly race,
Disporting on thy margent green,
The paths of pleasure trace:
Who foremost now delight to cleave
With pliant arm thy glassy wave?

The captive linnet which inthrall?

What idle progeny succeed

To chase the rolling circle's speed,
Or urge the flying ball?

While some, on earnest business bent,

Their murmuring labors ply,

'Gainst graver hours, that bring constraint,
To sweeten liberty;

Some bold adventurers disdain

The limits of their little reign,

And unknown regions dare descry,

Still as they run they look behind,
They hear a voice in every wind,
And snatch a fearful joy.

Gay Hope is theirs, by Fancy fed,
Less pleasing when possessed:

The tear forgot as soon as shed,

The sunshine of the breast;
Theirs buxom health of rosy hue,
Wild wit, invention ever new,

And lively cheer, of vigor born;
The thoughtless day, the easy night,
The spirits pure, the slumbers light,
That fly the approach of morn.

Alas! regardless of their doom,
The little victims play;

No sense have they of ills to come,
Nor care beyond to-day:

Yet see how all around them wait,
The ministers of human fate,

And black Misfortune's baleful train!
Ah! show them where in ambush stand,
To seize their prey, the murderous band!
Ah! tell them they are men!

*

To each his sufferings; all are men
Condemned alike to groan:

The tender for another's pain,

Th' unfeeling for his own.

Yet ah! why should they know their fate,
Since sorrow never comes too late,

And happiness too swiftly flies?

Thought would destroy their paradise -
No more! Where ignorance is bliss,
"Tis folly to be wise.

235. The Progress of Poesy.

I.

Awake, Æolian lyre! awake,

And give to rapture all thy trembling strings!
From Helicon's harmonious springs

A thousand rills their mazy progress take;
The laughing flowers, that round them blow,
Drink life and fragrance as they flow.

Now the rich stream of music winds along,

Deep, majestic, smooth, and strong,

Through verdant vales and Ceres' golden reign;

Now rolling down the steep amain,

Headlong, impetuous, see it pour;

The rocks and nodding groves rebellow to the roar.

II.

Woods that wave o'er Delphi's steep,
Isles that crown th' Ægean deep,

Fields that cool Ilissus laves,

Or where Meander's amber waves
In lingering labyrinths creep,
How do your tuneful echoes languish,
Mute but to the voice of Anguish?
Where each old poetic mountain
Inspiration breathed around;
Every shade and hallowed fountain

Murmured deep a solemn sound,
Till the sad Nine, in Greece's evil hour,

Left their Parnassus for the Latian plains,
Alike they scorn the pomp of tyrant Power

And coward Vice, that revels in her chains.

When Latium had her lofty spirit lost,

They sought, O Albion! next thy sea-encircled coast.

III.

Far from the sun and summer-gale,

In thy green lap was Nature's darling laid,

What time, where lucid Avon strayed,

To him the mighty Mother did unveil

Her awful face; the dauntless child
Stretched forth his little arms, and smiled.

This pencil take (she said) whose colors clear
Richly paint the vernal year;

Thine, too, these golden keys, immortal Boy!
This can unlock the gates of Joy,

Of Horror that, and thrilling Fears,

Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic Tears.

Nor second He that rode sublime

Upon the seraph-wings of Ecstasy;

The secrets of th' abyss to spy,

He passed the flaming bounds of place and time;
The living throne, the sapphire-blaze,

Where angels tremble while they gaze,

He saw; but blasted with excess of light,

Closed his eyes in endless night.

Behold where Dryden's less presumptuous car

Wide o'er the fields of glory bear

Two coursers of ethereal race,

With necks in thunder clothed and long-resounding pac

Hark! his hands the lyre explore!
Bright-eyed Fancy, hovering o'er,
Scatters from her pictured urn

Thoughts that breathe and words that burn;
But ah! 'tis heard no more.

O lyre divine! what dying spirit

Wakes thee now? though he inherit
Nor the pride nor ample pinion
That the Theban eagle bear,
Sailing with supreme dominion
Through the azure deep of air,
Yet oft before his infant eyes would run
Such forms as glitter in the Muse's ray

With orient hues, unborrowed of the sun;

Yet shall he mount, and keep his distant way

Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate,

Beneath the good how far - but far above the great.

WILLIAM COWPER. 1731-1800. (Manual, p. 357.)

FROM "THE TASK."

236. ON The Receipt of my Mother's Picture out of Norfolk, the Gift of MY COUSIN, ANN BODHAM.

O that those lips had language! Life has passed
With me but roughly since I heard thee last.
Those lips are thine - thy own sweet smile I see,
The same that oft in childhood solaced me;
Voice only fails, else how distinct they say,
"Grieve not, my child; chase all thy fears away!"
The meek intelligence of those dear eyes
(Blest be the art that can immortalize,
The art that baffles Time's tyrannic claim

To quench it) here shines on me still the same.
Faithful remembrancer of one so dear,

O welcome guest, though unexpected here!
Who bidd'st me honor with an artless song,
Affectionate, a mother lost so long.

I will obey, not willingly alone,

But gladly, as the precept were her own:
And, while that face renews my filial grief,
Fancy shall weave a charm for my relief,
Shall steep me in Elysian reverie,

A momentary dream, that thou.art she.

My mother! when I learned that thou wast dead,
Say, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed?

Hovered thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son,
Wretch even then, life's journey just begun?