James Beattie

“ Why should the sunbeam paint thy glittering clime,
When the keen mildew desolates the field!
How memory pains! Let some gay theme beguile
The musing mind, and sooth to soft delight.
Ye images of woe, no more recoil!
Be life’s past scenes wrapt in oblivious night.
Now when fierce Winter, armed with wasteful power,
Heaves the wild deep that thunders from afar;
How sweet to sit in this sequestered bower,
To hear, and but to hear, the mingling war!
Ambition here displays no gilded toy,
That tempts on desperate wing the soul to rise ”

“ Yields, gently led, to Virtue’s easy sway.
By thee inspired, O Virtue! Age is young,
And music warbles from the faltering tongue:
Thy ray creative cheers the clouded brow,
And decks the faded cheek with rosy glow,
Brightens the joyless aspect, and supplies
Pure heavenly lustre to the languid eyes:
But when Youth’s living bloom reflects thy beams,
Resistless on the view the glory streams;
Love, Wonder, Joy, alternately alarm,
And Beauty dazzles with angelic charm. ”

“ The pygmy warriors eye, with fearless glare,
The host thick swarming o’er the burthened air:
Thick swarming now, but to their native land
Doomed to return a scanty, straggling band.—
When sudden, darting down the depth of heaven,
Fierce on the expecting foe the cranes are driven.
The kindling phrensy every bosom warms,
The region echoes to the crash of arms:
Loose feathers from the encountering armies fly,
And in careering whirlwinds mount the sky.
To breathe from toil upsprings the panting crane,
Then with fresh vigour downward darts again.
Success in equal balance hovering hangs. ”

“ Where Reason’s meteor-rays, with sickly glow,
O’er the dun gloom a dreadful glimmering throw?
Disclosing dubious to the affrighted eye
O’erwhelming mountains tottering from on high,
Black billowy seas in storm perpetual toss’d,
And weary ways in wildering labyrinths lost.
O happy stroke, that bursts the bonds of clay,
Darts through the rending gloom the blaze of day,
And wings the soul with boundless flight to soar,
Where dangers threat, and fear alarms no more!
Transporting thought! here let me wipe away
The tear of grief, and wake a bolder lay. ”

“ How vain the hope of man!—But cease the strain,
Nor Sorrow’s dread solemnity profane;
Mixed with yon drooping mourners, on her bier
In silence shed the sympathetic tear.
ODE TO HOPE. [81] I. 1.
O thou, who glad’st the pensive soul,
More than Aurora’s smile the swain forlorn,
Left all night long to mourn
Where desolation frowns, and tempests howl;
And shrieks of woe, as intermits the storm,
Far o’er the monstrous wilderness resound,
And cross the gloom darts many a shapeless form,
And many a fire-eyed visage glares around,
O come, and be once more my guest! ”

“ O let them ne’er, with artificial note,
To please a tyrant, strain the little bill!
But sing what heaven inspires, and wander where they will.
VI. [6]
Liberal, not lavish, is kind Nature’s hand;
Nor was perfection made for man below.
Yet all her schemes with nicest art are planned,
Good counteracting ill, and gladness woe.
With gold and gems if Chilian mountains glow,
If bleak and barren Scotia’s hills arise;
There, plague and poison, lust and rapine grow;
Here, peaceful are the vales, and pure the skies,
And freedom fires the soul, and sparkles in the eyes. ”

“ Enraptured by the Hermit’s strain, the Youth
Proceeds the path of science to explore.
And now, expanding to the beams of truth,
New energies, and charms unknown before,
His mind discloses: Fancy now no more
Wantons on fickle pinion through the skies;
But, fixed in aim, and conscious of her power,
Sublime from cause to cause exults to rise,
Creation’s blended stores arranging as she flies. ”

“ The youth, his parent’s sole delight,
“Whose tooth the dewy lawns invite,
“Whose pulse in every vein beats strong,
“Whose limbs leap light the vales along,
“May yet e’er noontide meet his death,
“And lie dismembered on the heath:
“For youth, alas! nor cautious age,
“Nor strength, nor speed, eludes their rage.
“In every field we meet the foe,
“Each gale comes fraught with sounds of woe:
“The morning but awakes our fears,
“The evening sees us bathed in tears. ”

“ But hail, ye mighty masters of the lay,
Nature’s true sons, the friends of man and truth!
Whose song, sublimely sweet, serenely gay,
Amused my childhood, and informed my youth.
O let your spirit still my bosom sooth,
Inspire my dreams, and my wild wanderings guide!
Your voice each rugged path of life can smooth;
For well I know, wherever ye reside,
There harmony, and peace, and innocence, abide.
XLIII.
Ah me! abandoned on the lonesome plain,
As yet poor Edwin never knew your lore,
Save when against the winter’s drenching rain,
And driving snow, the cottage shut the door. ”

“ Yet, pure from lust of blood their fire,
And from Ambition’s wild desire,
They triumphed but to save. [121]
The Muse with joy attends their way
The vales of peace along;
There, to its Lord the village gay
Renews the grateful song.
Yon castle’s glittering towers contain
No pit of woe, nor clanking chain,
Nor to the suppliant’s wail resound:
The open doors the needy bless.
The unfriended hail their calm recess,
And gladness smiles around.
There, to the sympathetic heart
Life’s best delights belong,
To mitigate the mourner’s smart,
To guard the weak from wrong. ”

“ Who now will guard bewildered youth
Safe from the fierce assaults of hostile rage?
Such war can Virtue wage,
Virtue, that bears the sacred shield of Truth!
Alas! full oft on Guilt’s victorious car
The spoils of Virtue are in triumph borne;
While the fair captive, marked with many a scar,
In lone obscurity, oppressed, forlorn,
Resigns to tears her angel form.
Ill-fated youth, then, whither wilt thou fly? ”

“ Each crane the pygmy power in thought o’erturns,
And every bosom for the battle burns.
When genial gales the frozen air unbind,
The screaming legions wheel, and mount the wind. [94]
Far in the sky they form their long array,
And land and ocean stretch’d immense survey,
Deep, deep beneath; and triumphing in pride,
With clouds and winds commixed, innumerous ride;
’Tis wild obstreperous clangour all, and heaven
Whirls, in tempestuous undulation driven.
Nor less the alarm that shook the world below,
Where marched in pomp of war the embattled foe ”

“ Perfection, beauty, life, they never know,
But frown on all that pass, a monument of woe.
XLIX.
Shall he, whose birth, maturity, and age,
Scarce fill the circle of one summer-day,
Shall the poor gnat, with discontent and rage,
Exclaim that Nature hastens to decay,
If but a cloud obstruct the solar ray,
If but a momentary shower descend! ”

“ And cool, and fresh, and fragrant is the sky.
And, lo! in the dark east, expanded high,
The rainbow brightens to the setting sun!
Fond fool, that deem’st the streaming glory nigh,
How vain the chace thine ardour has begun!
’Tis fled afar, ere half thy purposed race be run.
XXXI.
Yet couldst thou learn, that thus it fares with age,
When pleasure, wealth, or power, the bosom warm,
This baffled hope might tame thy manhood’s rage,
And Disappointment of her sting disarm.——
But why should foresight thy fond heart alarm?
Perish the lore that deadens young desire! ”

“ And, mixed with shrieks of woe, the knells of death resound.
LXI.
Adieu, ye lays, that fancy’s flowers adorn,
The soft amusement of the vacant mind!
He sleeps in dust, and all the Muses mourn,
He, whom each virtue fired, each grace refined,
Friend, teacher, pattern, darling of mankind!
He sleeps in dust. Ah! how should I pursue
My theme! To heart-consuming grief resigned,
Here, on his recent grave I fix my view,
And pour my bitter tears.—Ye flowery lays, adieu!
LXII. [68]
Art thou, my Gregory, for ever fled! ”

“ That warms the bosom with sublime desire.
Thence the relentless heart forgets to feel,
And Hatred triumphs on the o’erwhelming brow,
And midnight Rancour grasps the cruel steel;
Blaze the blue flames of death, and sound the shrieks of woe. ”

“ The sound of woe and war arose.
The hares, distracted, scour the grove,
As terror and amazement drove;
But danger, wheresoe’er they fled,
Still seemed impending o’er their head.
Now crowded in a grotto’s gloom,
All hope extinct, they wait their doom:
Dire was the silence, till, at length,
Even from despair deriving strength,
With bloody eye, and furious look,
A daring youth arose, and spoke. [111]
“O wretched race, the scorn of Fate,
“Whom ills of every sort await! ”

“ Involved in fire-streaked gloom, the car comes on.
The rushing steeds grim Terror guides.
His forehead writhed to a relentless frown,
Aloft the angry Power of Battles rides.
Grasped in his mighty hand,
A mace, tremendous, desolates the land;
The tower rolls headlong down the steep,
The mountain shrinks before its wasteful sweep.
Chill horror the dissolving limbs invades,
Smit by the blasting lightning of his eyes;
A deeper gloom invests the howling shades;
Stripped is the shattered grove, and every verdure dies. ”

“ What heaps of chicken-carnage marked his course!
How oft, O Strymon, thy lone banks along,
Did wailing Echo waft the funeral song!
And now from far the mingling clamours rise,
Loud and more loud rebounding through the skies.
From skirt to skirt of heaven, with stormy sway,
A cloud rolls on, and darkens all the day.
Near and more near descends the dreadful shade,
And now in battleous array displayed,
On sounding wings, and screaming in their ire,
The cranes rush onward, and the fight require. ”

“ The pomp of groves, and garniture of fields;
All that the genial ray of morning gilds,
And all that echoes to the song of even,
All that the mountain’s sheltering bosom shields,
And all the dread magnificence of heaven,
O how canst thou renounce, and hope to be forgiven!
X. [8]
These charms shall work thy soul’s eternal health,
And love, and gentleness, and joy, impart.
But these thou must renounce, if lust of wealth
E’er win its way to thy corrupted heart;
For ah! it poisons like a scorpion’s dart ”

“ See Truth, Love, and Mercy, in triumph descending,
And Nature all glowing in Eden’s first bloom!
On the cold cheek of Death smiles and roses are blending,
And Beauty immortal awakes from the tomb! ”

“ Why, Lady, wilt thou bind thy lovely brow,
With the dread semblance of that warlike helm,
That nodding plume, and wreath of various glow,
That graced the chiefs of Scotia’s antient realm?
Thou knowest that virtue is of power the source,
And all her magic to thy eyes is given;
We own their empire, while we feel their force,
Beaming with the benignity of heaven. [126]
The plumy helmet, and the martial mien,
Might dignify Minerva’s awful charms ”

“ Oh, whither art thou fled, Saturnian Age!
Roll round again, majestic years!
To break the sceptre of tyrannic Rage;
From Woe’s wan cheek to wipe the bitter tears;
Ye years, again roll round!
Hark! from afar what desolating sound,
While echoes load the sighing gales,
With dire presage the throbbing heart assails!
Murder, deep-roused, with all the whirlwind’s haste,
And roar of tempest, from her cavern springs,
Her tangled serpents girds around her waist,
Smiles ghastly fierce, and shakes her gore-distilling wings.
I. 3. ”

“ The cranes pursue, and, clustering in a ring,
Chatter triumphant round the captive king.
But, ah! what pangs each pygmy bosom wrung,
When, now to cranes a prey, on talons hung, [98]
High in the clouds they saw their helpless lord,
His wriggling form still lessening as he soared!
Lo! yet again, with unabated rage,
In mortal strife the mingling hosts engage.
The crane with darted bill assaults the foe,
Hovering; then wheels aloft to scape the blow:
The dwarf in anguish aims the vengeful wound ”

“ And Poverty’s unconquerable bar,
In life’s low vale remote has pined alone,
Then dropt into the grave, unpitied and unknown!
II. [4]
And yet, the languor of inglorious days
Not equally oppressive is to all.
Him, who ne’er listened to the voice of praise,
The silence of neglect can ne’er appal.
There are, who, deaf to mad Ambition’s call,
Would shrink to hear th’ obstreperous trump of Fame;
Supremely blest, if to their portion fall
Health, competence, and peace. Nor higher aim
Had He, whose simple tale these artless lines proclaim.
III.
This sapient age disclaims all classic lore ”

“ And nought but the nightingale’s song in the grove:
’Twas then, by the cave of the mountain afar,
A Hermit his song of the night thus began;
No more with himself, or with nature, at war,
He thought as a sage, while he felt as a man:
“Ah! why thus abandoned to darkness and woe?
“Why thus, lonely Philomel, flows thy sad strain?
“For spring shall return, and a lover bestow,
“And thy bosom no trace of misfortune retain. [128]
“Yet, if pity inspire thee, ah! cease not thy lay,
“Mourn, sweetest complainer! ”

“ The leisure hour is all that thou can’st claim.
But on this verse if Montagu should smile,
New strains, ere long, shall animate thy frame:
And his applause to me is more than fame;
For still with truth accords his taste refined.
At lucre or renown let others aim,
I only wish to please the gentle mind,
Whom Nature’s charms inspire, and love of humankind.
[34] [35] THE
MINSTREL ”

“ The joyous swain
Eyes the gay villages again,
And gold-illumined spire;
While, on the billowy ether borne,
Floats the loose lay’s jovial measure;
And light along the fairy Pleasure,
Her green robes glittering to the morn,
Wantons on silken wing. And goblins all
To the damp dungeon shrink, or hoary hall,
Or westward, with impetuous flight,
Shoot to the desart realms of their congenial Night.
II. 1.
When first on Childhood’s eager gaze
Life’s varied landscape, stretch’d immense around,
Starts out of night profound,
Thy voice incites to tempt th’ untrodden maze. ”

“ When scarce his chirping bill had broke the shell.
Loud uproar hence, and rage of arms arose,
And the fell rancour of encountering foes;
Hence dwarfs and cranes one general havoc whelms,
And Death’s grim visage scares the pygmy realms. ”