James Thomson

“ That beam for ever thro' the boundless sky:
But, should he hide his face, th' astonish'd sun,
And all th' extinguish'd stars, would loosening start
Wide from their spheres, and Chaos come again.
⁠And yet was every faultering tongue of Man, ⁠185
Almighty Maker! silent in thy praise;
Thy works themselves would raise a general voice,
Even in the depth of solitary woods,
By human foot untrod, proclaim thy power,
And to the quire celestial Thee resound, ⁠190
Th' eternal cause, support and end of all!
⁠To me be Nature's volume broad-display'd ”

“ Like vivid blossoms glowing from afar,
Thick-swarm the brighter birds. For Nature's hand, ⁠735
That with a sportive vanity has deck'd
The plumy nations, there her gayest hues
Profusely pours. [5] But, if she bids them shine,
Array'd in all the beauteous beams of day,
Yet frugal still, she humbles them in song. ⁠740
Nor envy we the gaudy robes they lent
Proud Montezuma's realm, whose legions cast
A boundless radiance waving on the sun,
While Philomel is ours; while in our shades,
Thro' the soft silence of the listening night,⁠745
The sober-suited songstress trills her lay. ”

“ Nor deeper verdure dyes the robe of Spring,
When first she gives it to the southern gale,
Than the green Emerald shows. But, all combin'd,⁠155
Thick thro' the whitening Opal play thy beams;
Or, flying several from its surface, form
A trembling variance of revolving hues,
As the site varies in the gazer's hand.
⁠The very dead creation, from thy touch, ⁠160
Assumes a mimic life. By thee refin'd,
In brighter mazes the relucent stream
Plays o'er the mead. The precipice abrupt,
Projecting horror on the blackened flood,
Softens at thy return. ”

“ And all-protecting Freedom, which alone
Sustains the name and dignity of Man:
These are not theirs. The parent-sun himself
Seems o'er this world of slaves to tyrannize; ⁠880
And, with oppressive ray, the roseat bloom
Of beauty blasting, gives the gloomy hue,
And feature gross: or worse, to ruthless deeds,
Mad jealousy, blind rage, and fell revenge,
Their fervid spirit fires. Love dwells not there,⁠885
The soft regards, the tenderness of life,
The heart-shed tear, th' ineffable delight
Of sweet humanity: these court the beam
Of milder climes ”

“ Thro' the green-wood glade
Some love to stray; there lodg'd, amus'd and fed, ⁠255
In the fresh leaf. Luxurious, others make
The meads their choice, and visit every flower,
And every latent herb: for the sweet task,
To propagate their kinds, and where to wrap,
In what soft beds, their young yet undisclos'd, ⁠260
Employs their tender care. Some to the house,
The fold, and dairy, hungry, bend their flight ”

“ Their green-embroider'd robe to fiery brown,
And swift to green again, as scorching suns,
Or streaming dews and torrent rains, prevail. ⁠700
⁠Along these lonely regions, where retir'd,
From little scenes of art, great Nature dwells
In awful solitude, and nought is seen
But the wild herds that own no master's stall,
Prodigious rivers roll their fatning seas: ⁠705
On whose luxuriant herbage, half-conceal'd,
Like a fall'n cedar, far diffus'd his train,
Cas'd in green scales, the crocodile extends.
The flood disparts: behold! in plaited mail,
Behemoth [4] rears his head. ”

“ Sublimer swells, and o'er the world expands ⁠1220
A purer azure. Nature, from the storm,
Shines out afresh; and thro' the lighten'd air
A higher luster and a clearer calm,
Diffusive, tremble; while, as if in sign
Of danger past, a glittering robe of joy, ⁠1225
Set off abundant by the yellow ray,
Invests the fields: and nature smiles reviv'd.
⁠'Tis beauty all, and grateful song around,
Join'd to the low of kine, and numerous bleat
Of flocks thick-nibbling thro' the clover'd vale. ⁠1230
And shall the hymn be marr'd by thankless Man,
Most favour'd ”

“ That pois'd, impels, and rules the steady Whole.
⁠When now no more th' alternate Twins are fir'd,
And Cancer reddens with the solar blaze,
Short is the doubtful empire of the night:⁠45
And soon, observant of approaching day,
The meek-ey'd Morn appears, mother of dews,
At first faint-gleaming in the dappled east:
Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glow;
And, from before the lustre of her face,⁠50
White break the clouds away. With quicken'd step,
Brown Night retires: Young Day pours in apace,
And opens all the lawny prospect wide. ”

“ The heart beats glad; the fresh-expanded eye
And ear resume their watch; the sinews knit;
And life shoots swift thro' all the lightened limbs.
⁠Around th' adjoining brook, that purls along⁠480
The vocal grove, now fretting o'er a rock,
Now scarcely moving thro' a reedy pool,
Now starting to a sudden stream, and now
Gently diffus'd into a limpid plain;
A various groupe the herds and flocks compose,⁠485
Rural confusion! On the grassy bank
Some ruminating lie; while others stand
Half in the flood, and often bending sip
The circling surface. ”

“ And Mecca saddens at the long delay.
⁠But chief at sea, whose every flexile wave ⁠975
Obeys the blast, th' aërial tumult swells.
In the dread ocean, undulating wide,
Beneath the radiant line that girts the globe,
The circling [8] Typhon, whirl'd from point to point,
Exhausting all the rage of all the sky, ⁠980
And dire Ecnephia reign. Amid the heavens,
Falsely serene, deep in a cloudy [9] speck
Compress'd, the mighty tempest brooding dwells.
Of no regard, save to the skilful eye,
Fiery and foul, the small prognostic hangs ⁠985
Aloft, or on the promontory's brow
Musters its force. ”

“ Evading even the microscopic eye!
Full Nature swarms with life; one wondrous mass
Of animals, or atoms organiz'd,⁠290
Waiting the vital Breath, when Parent-Heaven
Shall bid his spirit blow. The hoary fen,
In putrid steams, emits the living cloud
Of pestilence. Thro' subterranean cells,
Where searching sun-beams scarce can find a way⁠295
Earth animated heaves. The flowery leaf
Wants not its soft inhabitants. ”

“ Or prone-descending rain. Wide-rent, the clouds, ⁠1140
Pour a whole flood; and yet, its flame unquench'd,
Th' unconquerable lightning struggles through,
Ragged and fierce, or in red whirling balls,
And fires the mountains with redoubled rage.
Black from the stroke, above, the smouldering pine ⁠1145
Stands a shattered trunk; and, stretch'd below,
A lifeless groupe the blasted cattle lie:
Here the soft flock, with that same harmless look
They wore alive, and ruminating still
In fancy's eye; and there the frowning bull, ⁠1150
And ox half-rais'd. ”

“ Swell on the sight, and brighten with the dawn.⁠55
Blue, thro' the dusk, the smoking currents shine;
And from the bladed field the fearful hare
Limps, aukward: while along the forest-glade
The wild deer trip, and often turning gaze
At early passenger. Music awakes ⁠60
The native voice of undissembled joy;
And thick around the woodland hymns arise.
Rous'd by the cock, the soon-clad shepherd leaves
His mossy cottage, where with Peace he dwells;
And from the crouded fold, in order, drives ⁠65
His flock, to taste the verdure of the morn.
⁠Falsely luxurious, will not Man awake ”

“ Nor thee, his antient master, laughing sage,
Chaucer, whose native manners-painting verse,
Well-moraliz'd, shines thro' the Gothic cloud
Of time and language o'er thy genius thrown.
⁠May my song soften, as thy Daughters I, ⁠1575
Britannia, hail! for beauty is their own,
The feeling heart, simplicity of life,
And elegance, and taste: the faultless form,
Shap'd by the hand of harmony; the cheek,
Where the live crimson, thro' the native white ⁠1580
Soft-shooting, o'er the face diffuses bloom,
And every nameless grace ”

“ In all philosophy. For lofty sense,
Creative fancy, and inspection keen
Thro' the deep windings of the human heart ⁠1560
Is not wild Shakespeare thine and Nature's boast?
Is not each great, each amiable Muse
Of classic ages in thy Milton met?
A genius universal as his theme,
Astonishing as chaos, as the bloom ⁠1565
Of blowing Eden fair, as heaven sublime. ”

“ ⁠Welcome, ye shades! ye bowery thickets, hail!
Ye lofty pines! ye venerable oaks!⁠470
Ye ashes wild, resounding o'er the steep!
Delicious is your shelter to the soul,
As to the hunted hart the sallying spring,
Or stream full-flowing, that his swelling sides
Laves, as he floats along the herbag'd brink,⁠475
Cool, thro' the nerves, your pleasing comfort glides; ”

“ To taste the lucid coolness of the flood.
Ah then! not Paris on the piny top
Of Ida panted stronger, when aside ⁠1300
The rival-goddesses the veil divine
Cast unconfin'd, and gave him all their charms,
Than, Damon, thou; as from the snowy leg,
And slender foot, th' inverted silk she drew;
As the soft touch dissolv'd the virgin zone;⁠1305
And, thro' the parting robe, th' alternate breast,
With youth wild-throbbing, on thy lawless gaze
In full luxuriance rose. But, desperate youth,
How durst thou risque the soul-distracting view ”

“ Wildered, and tossing thro' distemper'd dreams?
Who would in such a gloomy state remain
Longer than Nature craves; when every Muse
And every blooming pleasure wait without,
To bless the wildly-devious morning-walk? ”

“ And o'er the vary'd landskip, restless, rove,
Fervent with life of every fairer kind:⁠775
A land of wonders! which the sun still eyes
With ray direct, as of the lovely realm
Inamour'd, and delighting there to dwell. ”

“ Or rather to Parental Nature pay
The tears of grateful joy, who for a while
Lent thee this younger-self, this opening bloom
Of thy enlighten'd mind and gentle worth.⁠580
Believe the Muse: the wintry blast of death
Kills not the buds of virtue; no, they spread,
Beneath the heavenly beam of brighter suns,
Thro' endless ages, into higher powers. ”

“ Dread thro' the dun expanse; save the dull sound,
That from the mountain, previous to the storm,
Rolls o'er the muttering earth, disturbs the flood,
And shakes the forest-leaf without a breath.⁠1115
Prone, to the lowest vale, th' aërial tribes
Descend: the tempest-loving raven scarce
Dares wing the dubious dusk. In rueful gaze
The cattle stand, and on the scowling heavens
Cast a deploring eye ”

“ Shed by the morn, their new-flush'd bloom resign,
Before the parching beam? so fade the fair,
When fevers revel thro' their azure veins. ⁠215
But one, the lofty follower of the sun,
Sad when he sets, shuts up her yellow leaves,
Drooping all night ”

“ Wildly, thro' all his melancholy bounds.
Rude ruins glitter; and the briny deep,
Seen from some pointed promontory's top,
Far to the blue horizon's utmost verge,
Restless, reflects a floating gleam. But this, ⁠170
And all the much-transported Muse can sing.
Are to thy beauty, dignity, and use,
Unequal far, great delegated source
Of light, and life, and grace, and joy below!
⁠How shall I then attempt to sing of Him, ⁠175
Who, Light Himself, in uncreated light
Invested deep, dwells awfully retir'd
From mortal eye, or angel's purer ken ”