Gambar halaman
PDF
ePub

Trees, plants, cooling fruits, and sweet flowers,
All rise to the praise of my God.

Shall man, the great master of all,
The only insensible prove?
Forbid it, fair Gratitude's call!

Forbid it, Devotion and Love!

The Lord, who such wonders could raise,
And still can destroy with a nod,
My lips shall incessantly praise;
My heart shall rejoice in my God.

Friendship.

FRIENDSHIP, peculiar boon of heav'n,
The noble mind's delight and pride,
To men and angels only giv'n,

To all the lower world deny'd.

While love, unknown among the blest,
Parent of thousand wild desires,
The savage and the human breast
Torments alike, with raging fires.

With bright, but oft destructive gleam,
Alike o'er all his lightnings fly,
The lambent glories only beam
Around the fav'rites of the sky.

Thy gentle flows of guiltless joys,
On fools and villains ne'er descend,
In vain for thee the tyrant sighs,
And hugs a flatt'rer for a friend.

Directress of the brave and just,

O guide us through life's darksome way And let the tortures of mistrust

On selfish bosoms only prey.

Nor shall thine ardours cease to glow,
When souls to peaceful climes remove :
What rais'd our virtue here below,
Shall aid our happiness above.

Compassion and Foregiveness.

I HEAR the voice of wo;

A brother mortal mourns:

My eyes with tears, for tears o'erflow;
My heart his sighs returns.

I hear the thirsty cry,

The famish'd beg for bread:

O let my spring its streams supply:
My hand its bounty shed.

And shall not wrath relent,
Touch'd by that humble strain,
My brother crying, 'I repent,
Nor will offend again?"

How else, on sprightly wing,
Can Hope bear high my pray'r,
Up to thy throne, my God, my King,
To plead for pardon there?

Tenderness of Mind.

I HAVE found out a gift for my fair;
I have found where the wood-pigeons breed;
But ah, let me that plunder forbear!

She will say 'tis a barbarous deed.

For he ne'er can be true, she averr'd,
Who can rob a poor bird of its young;
And I lov'd her the more when I heard
Such tenderness fall from her tongue.

I have heard her with sweetness unfold.
How that pity was due to a dove;
That it ever attended the bold;

And she call'd it the sister of love.

Early Rising.

How foolish they who lengthen night,
And slumber in the morning light!
How sweet, at early morning's rise,
To view the glories of the skies,
And mark with curious eye the sun
Prepare his radiant course to run!
Its fairest form then nature wears,
And clad in brightest green appears.
The sprightly lark, with artless lay,
Proclaims the entrance of the day.
How sweet to breathe the gale's perfume,
And feast the eyes with nature's bloom!
Along the dewy lawn to rove,
And hear the music of the grove!
Nor you, ye delicate and fair,
Neglect to taste the morning air;
This will your nerves with vigour brace,
Improve and heighten every grace;
Add to your breath a rich perfume;
And to your cheeks a fairer bloom;
With lustre teach your eyes to glow,
And health and cheerfulness bestow

The Goldfinches.

ALL in a garden, on a current bush,
Two Goldfinches had built their airy seat;
In the next orchard liv'd a friendly thrush,
Not distant far, a wood-lark's soft retreat.

Here, blest with ease, and in each other blest,
With early songs they wak'd the neighb'ring groves;
Till time matur'd their joy, and crown'd their nest,
With infant pledges of their faithful loves.

And now, what transport glow'd in either's eye!
What equal fondness dealt th' allotted food!
What joy each other's likeness to descry,
And future sonnets in the chirping brood!

But ah! what earthly happiness can last!
How does the fairest purpose often fail!
A truant schoolboy's wantonness could blast
Their flatt'ring hopes, and leave them both to wail.
The most ungentle of his tribe was he;

No gen'rous precept ever touch'd his heart:
With concord false, and hideous prosody,

He scrawl'd his task, and blunder'd o'er his part.
On mischief bent, he mark'd with rav'nous eyes,
Where, wrapt in down, the callow songsters lay;
Then rushing, rudely seiz'd the glitt'ring prize,
And bore it in his impious hands away!

But how shall I describe in numbers rude,
The pangs for poor Chrysomitris decreed,
When from her secret stand aghast, she view'd
The cruel spoiler perpetrate the deed!

"O grief of griefs! with shrieking voice she crieu,
'What sight is this that I have liv'd to see!
O! that I had in youth's fair season died,
From all false joys, and bitter sorrows free.

Was it for this, alas! with weary bill,

Was it for this I pois'd th' unwieldy straw; For this I bore the moss from yonder hill,

Nor shunn'd the pond'rous stick along to draw?

Was it for this I pick'd the wool with care,
Intent with nicer skill our work to crown;
For this, with pain, I bent the stubborn hair,
And lin'd our cradle with the thistle's down?

Was it for this my freedom I resign'd,

And ceas'd to rove at large from plain to plain; For this I sat at home whole days confin'd,

To bear the scorching heat and pealing rain?

Was it for this my watchful eyes grow dim?

For this the roses on my check turn pale? Pale is my golden plumage, once so trim ! And all my wonted mirth and spirits fail!'

Thus sang the mournful bird her piteous tale;

The piteous tale her mournful mate return'd: Then side by side they sought the distant vale; And there in secret sadness inly mourn'd.

Elegy to Pity.

HAIL, lovely power! whose bosom heaves the sigh,
When fancy paints the scene of deep distress;
Whose tears spontaneous crystalize the eye,
When rigid fate denies the power to bless.

Not all the sweets Arabia's gales convey

From flow'ry meads, can with that sigh compare; Nor dew drops glitt'ring in the morning ray, Seem ne'er so beauteous as that falling tear

Devoid of fear, the fawns around thee play; Emblem of peace, the dove before thee flies: No blood-stain'd traces mark thy blameless way;" Beneath thy feet no hapless insect dies.

Come, lovely nymph, and range the mead with me,
To spring the partridge from the guileful foe;
From secret snares the struggling bird to free;
And stop the hand uprais'd to give the blow.

And when the air with heat meridian glows,
And nature droops beneath the conqu'ring gleam,
Let us, slow wandering where the current flows,
Save sinking flies that float along the stream.

Or turn to nobler, greater tasks thy care,
To me thy sympathetic gifts impart;
Teach me in friendship's grief to bear a share,
And justly boast the gen'rous feeling heart.

Teach me to sooth the helpless orphan's grief;
With timely aid the widow's woes assuage;
To mis'ry's moving cries to yield relief;

And be the sure resource of drooping age.

So when the genial spring of life shall fade,
And sinking nature own the dread decay,
Some soul congenial then may lend its aid,
And gild the close of life's eventful day.

The Sluggard.

'Tis the voice of the Sluggard-I heard him complain, "You have wak'd me too soon, I must slumber again.' As the door on its hinges, so he on his bed,

Turns his sides and his shoulders, and his heavy head.

A little more sleep, and a little more slumber;"

Thus he wastes half his days, and his hours without number
And when he gets up, he sits folding his hands,
Or walks about sauntering, or trifling he stands.

I pass'd by his garden, and saw the wild brier,
The thorn, and the thistle, grow broader and higher,
The clothes that hang on him are turning to rags;
And his money still wastes, till he starves or he begs.

I made him a visit, still hoping to find

He had ta'en better care for improving his mind :
He told me his dreams, talk'd of eating and drinking;
But he scarce reads the Bible, and never loves thinking.

Said I then to my heart, 'Here's a lesson for me;
That man's but a picture of what I might be :
But thanks to my friends for their care in my breeding,
Who taught me betimes to love working and reading!'

Remember the Poor.

Now winter is come, with his cold chilling breath,
And the verdure has dropp'd from the trees;
All nature seems touch'd with the finger of death,
And the streams are beginning to freeze.

When wanton young lads, o'er the river can slide,
And Flora attends us no more;

When in plenty you sit by a good fire-side,

Sure you ought to remember the poor.

When the cold feather'd snow does in plenty descend,
And whiten the prospect around;

When the keen cutting winds from the north shall attend,
Hard chilling and freezing the ground;

When the hills and the dales are all candied with white,

When the rivers congeal to the shore,

When the bright twinkling stars shall proclaim a cold night,
Then remember the state of the poor...

When the poor harmless hare may be trac'd to the wood,
By her footsteps indented in snow;

When the lips and the fingers are starting with blood;
When the marksmen a cock-shooting go;

When the poor robin redbreast approaches the cot;

When the icicles hang at the door;

When the bowl smokes with something reviving and hot,

That's the time to remember the poor.

« SebelumnyaLanjutkan »