Imágenes de página
PDF
ePub

say so much but that the reader may perceive he was capable of faying more, and left fome things unobserved in compliment to his fagacity. Milton's L'Allegro and Il Penferofo are to be admir'd on this account, as well as others, for in these every thing paffes as it were in a review before you, and one thought starts a hundred. Defcriptive Poems are made beautiful by fimilies properly introduced, images of feigned perfons, and allufions to ancient fables, or historical facts; as will appear by a perusal of the best of these poems, efpecially thofe of Milton abovemention'd, Den'ham's Cooper's Hill, and Pope's Windfor Foreft. The L'Allegro and Il Penferofo we shall introduce as examples, but the others are too long for our purpose.

L'ALLEGRO Or the lively Pleasures of Mirth.

Hence loathed melancholy,

Of Cerberus and blackest midnight born,
In Stygian cave forlorn

'Mongft horrid shapes, and fhrieks and fights unholy,
Find out fome uncouth cell,

Where brooding darknefs fpreads his jealous wings,
And the night raven fings;

There under ebon fhades, and low brow'd rocks,
As ragged as thy locks..

In dark Cimmerian defert ever dwell:

But come thou goddess fair and free,

In heav'n ycleap'd Euprofyne,

And by men, heart-eafing mirth,
Whom lovely Venus at a birth,
With two fifter Graces more
To ivy crowned Bacchus bore;
Or whether (as fome fages fing)
The frolic wind that breathes the fpring,
Zephyr with Aurora playing,

As he met her once a maying,
There on beds of violets blue,
And fresh-blown rofes wafh'd in dew,
Fill'd her with thee a daughter fair,
So buxom, blithe, and debonair;
Hafte thee, nymph, and bring with thee
Jeft and youthful Jollity,

Quips and cranks, and wanton wiles,
Nods and becks, and wreathed fmiles,

Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimple sleek ;
Sport that wrinkled care derides,
And Laughter holding both his fides.
Come, and trip it as you go
On the light fantastic toe,

And in thy right hand lead with thee,
The mountain nymph sweet Liberty ;
And if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew
To live with her, and live with thee,
In unreproved pleafures free;
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And fingling ftartle the dull Night,
From his watch-tow'r in the skies,
Till the dapple Dawn doth rife;
Then to come in fpite of sorrow,
And at my window bid good morrow,
Through the sweet-briar, or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine:

While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of Darkness thin,
And to the ftack, or the barn-door,
Stoutly ftruts his dames before:
Oft lift'ning how the hounds and horn
Chearly roufe the flumb'ring Morn,
From the fide of fome hoar hill,
Through the high wood echoing fhrill:
Sometime walking not unfeen

By hedge-row elms, or hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate,
Where the great Sun begins his ftate,
Rob'd in flames and amber light,
'The clouds in thousand liveries dight,
While the plow-man near at hand
Whiftles o'er the furrow'd land,
And the milk-maid fingeth blithe,
And the mower whets his fcythe,
And every fhepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Strait mine eye hath caught new pleasures
Whilst the landskip round it measures,

Ruffet lawns, and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do ftray,
Mountains on whose barren breast
The lab'ring clouds do often reft,
Meadows trim with daisies pied,
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide:
Towers and battlements it fees
Bofom'd high in tufted trees,
Where perhaps fome beauty lies,
The Cynofure of neighb'ring eyes.
Hard by, a cottage chimney fmokes.
From betwixt two aged oaks,
Where Corydon and Thyrfis met,
Are at their favory dinner set

Of herbs, and other country meffes,
Which the neat-handed Phillis dreffes ;
And then in hafte her bow'r fhe leaves,
With Theftylis to bind the sheaves;
Or if the earlier season lead

To the tann'd haycock in the mead.
Sometimes with fecure delight
The upland hamlets will invite
When the merry bells ring round,
And the jocond rebecks found

To many a youth, and many a maid,
Dancing in the chequer'd fhade;
And young and old come forth to play
On a funfhine holy day,

Till the live long day-light fail;
Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,
With ftories told of many a feat,
How fairy Mab the junkets eat;
She was pincht, and pull'd, she said,
And he by friar's lanthorn led ;
Tells how the drudging goblin fweat,
To earn his cream-bowl duly fet,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,
His fhadowy flail had thresh'd the corn,
That ten day lab'rers could not end;
Then lays him down the lubber fiend,
And ftretch'd out all the chimney's length,
Basks at the fire his hairy ftrength,

And crop-full out of doors he flings,
Ere the first cock his matin rings,
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,
By whifp'ring winds foon lull'd asleep.
Towered cities please us then,
And the bufy hum of men,

Where throngs of knights and barons bold
In weeds of peace high triumphs hold,
With ftore of ladies whose bright eyes
Rain influence, and judge the prize
Of wit, or arms, while both contend
To win her grace, whom all commend.
There let Hymen oft appear

In faffron robe, with taper clear,
And pomp, and feaft, and revelry,
With mask, and antique pageantry,
Such fights as youthful poets dream
On fummer eves by haunted stream.
Then to the well-trod stage anon,
If Johnson's learned fock be on,
Or fweeteft Shakespear, Fancy's child,
Warble his native wood-notes wild;
And ever against eating cares,
Lap me in foft Lydian airs,
Married to immortal verfe,
Such as the meeting foul may pierce
In notes, with many a winding bout
Of linked fweetness long drawn out,
With wanton heed, and giddy cunning,
The melting voice through mazes running,
Untwisting all the chains that tye

The hidden foul of harmony;
That Orpheus felf may heave his head
From golden flumber on a bed
Of heapt Elysian flow'rs, and hear

Such ftrains as would have won the ear
Of Pluto, to have quite set free
His half-regain'd Eurydice.
Thefe delights if thou canft give,

Mirth with thee I mean to live.

IL PENSEROSO: Or the gloomy Pleafures of Melancholy.

Hence vain deluding joys,

The brood of Folly without father bred,
How little you bested,

Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys!
Dwell in fome idle brain,

And fancies fond with gaudy fhapes poffefs, As thick and numberless

As the gay motes that people the fun-beams, Or likeft hovering dreams,

The fickle penfioners of Morpheus' train. But hail! thou goddess, fage and holy, Hail! divineft Melancholy,

Whofe faintly visage is too bright

To hit the fenfe of human fight,

And therefore to our weaker view

O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue;

Black, but fuch as in esteem

Prince Memnon's fifter might be seen,

Or that starr'd Ethiop queen that strove
To fet her beauties praise above

The Sea-nymphs, and their pow'rs offended:
Yet thou art higher far defcended;
Thee bright-hair'd Vefta long of yore
To folitary Saturn bore;

His daughter fhe (in Saturn's reign
Such mixture was not held a ftain)
Oft in glimmering bow'rs and glades
He met her, and in fecret fhades
Of woody Ida's inmoft grove,
While yet there was no fear of Jove.
Come penfive nun, devout and pure,
Sober, stedfast, and demure,
All in robe of darkest grain,
Flowing with majestic train,
And fable ftole of Cyprus lawn,
O'er thy decent fhoulders drawn.
Come, but keep thy wonted state,
With even step, and mufing gate,
And looks commercing with the skies,
Thy rapt foul fitting in thine eyes:

« AnteriorContinuar »