But let untender thoughts afar be driven; Nor venture to arraign the dread decree. For know, to man, as candidate for Heaven, The voice of the Eternal said, Be free: And this divine prerogative to thee Does virtue, happiness, and Heaven convey; For virtue is the child of liberty,
And happiness of virtue; nor can they
When all were great and free! man's sole employ
To deck the bosom of his parent earth;
Or toward his bower the murmuring stream decoy,
To aid the flow'ret's long-expected birth,
And lull the bed of peace, and crown the board of mirth.
Sweet were your shades, O ye primeval groves! Be free to keep the path, who are not free to stray. Whose boughs to man his food and shelter lent,
"Yet leave me not. I would allay that grief,
Which else might thy young virtue overpower,
And in thy converse I shall find relief,
When the dark shades of melancholy lower;
For solitude has many a dreary hour,
Even when exempt from grief, remorse, and pain:
Come often then; for, haply, in my bower,
Amusement, knowledge, wisdom thou may'st gain :
If I one soul improve, I have not liv'd in vain."
And now, at length, to Edwin's ardent gaze
The Muse of history unrolls her page.
But few, alas! the scenes her art displays,
To charm his fancy, or his heart engage.
Here chiefs their thirst of power in blood assuage,
And straight their flames with tenfold fierceness burn:
Here smiling Virtue prompts the patriot's rage,
But lo, ere-long, is left alone to mourn,
And languish in the dust, and clasp th' abandon'd
"Ambition's slippery verge shall mortals tread,
Where ruin's gulf unfathom'd yawns beneath!
Shall life, shall liberty, be lost," he said,
"For the vain toys that pomp and power bequeath!
The car of victory, the plume, the wreath,
Defend not from the bolt of fate the brave:
No note the clarion of renown can breathe,
Talarm the long night of the lonely grave,
Or check the headlong haste of time's o'erwhelming
"Ah, what avails it to have trac'd the springs
That whirl of empire the stupendous wheel!
Ah, what have I to do with conquering kings,
Hands drench'd in blood, and breasts begirt with
steel!
To those, whom Nature taught to think and feel,
Heroes, alas! are things of small concern;
Could History man's secret heart reveal,
And what imports a heaven-born mind to learn,
Her transcripts to explore what bosom would not
yearn!
"This praise, O Cheronean sage,* is thine!
(Why should this praise to thee alone belong?)
All else from Nature's moral path decline,
Lur'd by the toys that captivate the throng;
To herd in cabinets and camps, among
Spoil, carnage, and the cruel pomp of pride;
Or chant of heraldry the drowsy song,
How tyrant blood, o'er many a region wide,
Rolls to a thousand thrones its execrable tide.
"O who of man the story will unfold, Ere victory and empire wrought annoy, In that elysian age (misnam'd of gold) The age of love, and innocence and joy,
Pure in his pleasures, happy in his loves,
His eye still smiling, and his heart content.
Then, hand in hand, health, sport, and labor went.
Nature supplied the wish she taught to crave.
None prowl'd for prey, none watch'd to circumvent.
To all an equal lot Heaven's bounty gave:
No vassal fear'd his lord, no tyrant fear'd his slave.
"But ah! th' historic Muse has never dar'd
To pierce those hallow'd bowers: 'tis Fancy's beam
Pour'd on the vision of the enraptur'd bard,
That paints the charms of that delicious theme.
Then hail sweet Fancy's ray! and hail the dream
That weans the weary soul from guilt and woe!
Careless what others of my choice may deem,
I long, where Love and Fancy lead, to go
And meditate on Heaven, enough of Earth I know."
"I cannot blame thy choice," the sage replied,
"For soft and smooth are Fancy's flowery ways.
And yet, even there, if left without a guide,
The young adventurer unsafely plays.
Eyes dazzled long by fiction's gaudy rays
In modest truth no light nor beauty find.
And who, my child, would trust the meteor-blaze,
That soon must fail, and leave the wanderer blind,
More dark and helpless far, than if it ne'er had
shin'd?
"Fancy enervates, while it soothes, the heart,
And, while it dazzles, wounds the mental sight:
To joy each heightening charm it can impart,
But wraps the hour of woe in tenfold night.
And often, where no real ills affright,
Its visionary fiends, an endless train,
Assail with equal or superior might,
And through the throbbing heart, and dizzy brain,
And shivering nerves, shoot stings of more than
mortal pain.
"And yet, alas! the real ills of life
Claim the full vigor of a mind prepar'd,
Prepar'd for patient, long, laborious strife,
Its guide experience, and truth its guard.
We fare on Earth as other men have far'd.
Were they successful? Let not us despair.
Was disappointment oft their sole reward?
Yet shall their tale instruct, if it declare
How they have borne the load ourselves are doom'd
to bear.
But she, who set on fire his infant heart,
And all his dreams, and all his wanderings, shar'd
And bless'd, the Muse, and her celestial art,
Still claim'd the enthusiast's fond and first regard.
From Nature's beauties variously compar'd
And variously combin'd, he learns to frame
Those forms of bright perfection, which the bard,
While boundless hopes and boundless views inflame,
Enamour'd, consecrates to never-dying fame.
Of late, with cumbersome, though pompous show,
Edwin would oft his flowery rhyme deface,
Through ardor to adorn; but Nature now
To his experienc'd eye a modest grace
Presents, where ornament the second place
Holds, to intrinsic worth and just design
Subservient still. Simplicity apace
Tempers his rage: he owns her charm divine,
And clears th' ambiguous phrase, and lops th' un-
wieldy line.
Fain would I sing (much yet unsung remains)
What sweet delirium o'er his bosom stole,
When the great shepherd of the Mantuan plain
His deep majestic melody 'gan roll :
Fain would I sing what transport storm'd his soul,
How the red current throbb'd his veins along,
When, like Pelides, bold beyond control,
Without art graceful, without effort strong,
Homer rais'd high to Heaven the loud, the impetu-
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