Ah, no! she darkly sees the fate of man,
Her dim horizon bounded to a span;
Or, if she hold an image to the view,
"Tis Nature pictured too severely true.
With thee, sweet Hope! resides the heavenly light
That pours remotest rapture on the sight:
Thine is the charm of Life's bewilder'd way,
That calls each slumbering passion into play.
Waked by thy touch, I see the sister band,
On tiptoe watching, start at thy command,
And fly where'er thy mandate bids them steer,
To Pleasure's path, or Glory's bright career.
Primeval Hope, the Aönian muses say,
When man and Nature mourn'd their first decay;
When every form of death, and every wo,
Shot from malignant stars to earth below;
When Murder bared her arm, and rampant War
Yoked the red dragons of her iron car;
When Peace and Mercy, banish'd from the plain,
Sprung on the viewless winds to Heaven again;
All, all forsook the friendless, guilty mind,
But Hope, the charmer, linger'd still behind.
Thus, while Elijah's burning wheels prepare From Carmel's heights to sweep the fields of air, The prophet's mantle, ere his flight began, Dropp'd on the world—a sacred gift to man.
Auspicious Hope! in thy sweet garden grow Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every wo; Won by their sweets, in Nature's languid hour, The wayworn pilgrim seeks thy summer bow'r; There, as the wild bee murmurs on the wing, What peaceful dreams thy handmaid spirits bring! What viewless forms th' Æolian organ play,
And sweep the furrow'd lines of anxious thought away!
Angel of life! thy glittering wings explore
Earth's loneliest bounds, and ocean's wildest shore.
Lo! to the wintry winds the pilot yields
His bark, careering o'er unfathom'd fields;
Now on Atlantic waves he rides afar,
Where Andes, giant of the western star,
With meteor-standard to the winds unfurl'd,
Looks from his throne of clouds o'er half the world!
Now far he sweeps, where scarce a summer
On Behring's rocks, or Greenland's naked isles:
Cold on his midnight watch the breezes blow,
From wastes that slumber in eternal snow;
And waft, across the wave's tumultuous roar,
The wolf's long howl from Oonalaska's shore.
Poor child of danger, nursling of the storm,
Sad are the woes that wreck thy manly form!
Rocks, waves, and winds the shatter'd bark delay;
Thy heart is sad, thy home is far away.
But Hope can here her moonlight vigils keep, And sing to charm the spirit of the deep: Swift as yon streamer lights the starry pole, Her visions warm the watchman's pensive soul; His native hills, that rise in happier climes, The grot, that heard his song of other times, His cottage home, his bark of slender sail, His glassy lake, and broomwood-blossom'd vale, Rush on his thought; he sweeps before the wind, Treads the loved shore he sigh'd to leave behind; Meets at each step a friend's familiar face, And flies at last to Helen's long embrace; Wipes from her cheek the rapture speaking tear, And clasps, with many a sigh, his children dear! While, long neglected, but at length caress'd, His faithful dog salutes the smiling guest; Points to the master's eyes, where'er they roam, His wistful face, and whines a welcome home.
Friend of the brave! in peril's darkest hour, Intrepid virtue looks to thee for power;
To thee the heart its trembling homage yields,
. On stormy floods and carnage-cover'd fields,
When front to front the banner'd hosts combine,
Halt ere they close, and form the dreadful line.
When all is still on death's devoted soil,
The march-worn soldier mingles for the toil;
As rings his glittering tube, he lifts on high
The dauntless brow and spirit-speaking eye,
Hails in his heart the triumph yet to come,
And hears thy stormy music in the drum!
Propitious power! when rankling cares annoy
The sacred home of Hymenean joy;
When doom'd to poverty's sequester'd dell,
The wedded pair of love and virtue dwell,
Unpitied by the world, unknown to fame,
Their woes, their wishes, and their hearts the same;
Oh, there, prophetic Hope! thy smile bestow,
And chase the pangs that worth should never know;
There, as the parent deals his scanty store
To friendless babes, and weeps to give no more,
Tell that his manly race shall yet assuage
Their father's wrongs, and shield his latter age.
What though for him no Hybla sweets distil,
Nor bloomy vines wave purple on the hill;
Tell that, when silent years have pass'd away,
That when his eyes grow dim, his tresses gray,
These busy hands a lovelier cot shall build,
And deck with fairer flowers his little field,
And call from Heaven propitious dews to breathe
Arcadian beauty on the barren heath;
Tell that, while Love's spontaneous smile endears
The days of peace, the sabbath of his years,
Health shall prolong to many a festive hour
The social pleasures of his humble bower.
Lo! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps,
Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps;
She, while the lovely babe unconscious lies,
Smiles on her slumbering child with pensive eyes,
And weaves a song of melancholy joy :.
Sleep, image of thy father, sleep, my boy:
No lingering hour of sorrow shall be thine;
No sigh, that rends thy father's heart and mine;
Bright as his manly sire the son shall be
In form and soul; but, ah! more bless'd than he !
Thy fame, thy worth, thy filial love, at last,
Shall sooth his aching heart for all the past;
With many a smile my solitude repay,
And chase the world's ungenerous scorn away.
"And say, when summon'd from the world and thee,
I lay my head beneath the willow-tree,
Wilt thou, sweet mourner! at my stone appear,
And sooth my parted spirit lingering near?
Oh, wilt thou come, at evening hour to shed
The tears of memory o'er my narrow bed;
With aching temples on thy hand reclined,
Muse on the last farewell I leave behind;
Breathe a deep sigh to winds that murmur low,
And think on all my love and all my wo?"
So speaks Affection ere the infant eye
Can look regard, or brighten in reply;
But when the cherub lip hath learn'd to claim
A mother's ear by that endearing name;
Soon as the playful innocent can prove
A tear of pity or a smile of love,
Or cons his murmuring task beneath her care,
Or lisps with holy look his evening prayer,
Or gazing, mutely pensive, sits to hear
The mournful ballad warbled in his ear-
How fondly looks admiring Hope the while
At every artless tear and every smile!
How glows the joyous parent to descry
A guileless bosom, true to sympathy!
In joyous youth, what soul hath never known Thought, feeling, taste, harmonious to its own?
Who hath not paused while Beauty's pensive eye
Ask'd from his heart the homage of a sigh?
Who hath not own'd, with rapture-smitten frame,
The power of grace, the magic of a name?
There be, perhaps, who barren hearts avow,
Cold as the rocks on Torneo's hoary brow!
There be, whose loveless wisdom never fail'd,
In self-adoring pride securely mail'd:
But triumph not, ye peace-enamour'd few!
Fire, Nature, Genius, never dwelt with you!
For you no fancy consecrates the scene
Where Rapture utter'd vows, and wept between;
"Tis yours, unmoved, to sever and to meet;
No pledge is sacred, and no home is sweet!
Who that would ask a heart to dulness wed,
The waveless calm, the slumber of the dead?
No; the wild bliss of Nature needs alloy,
And Fear and Sorrow fan the fire of Joy!
And say, without our hopes, without our fears,
Without the home that plighted love endears,
Without the smile from partial beauty won,
Oh! what were man? a world without a sun.
Till Hymen brought his love-delighted hour,
There dwelt no joy in Eden's rosy bower!
In vain the viewless seraph lingering there,
At starry midnight charm'd the silent air;
In vain the wild-bird caroll'd on the steep,
To hail the sun, slow wheeling from the deep;
In vain, to sooth the solitary shade,
Aërial notes in mingling measure play'd;
The summer wind, that shook the spangled tree,
The whispering wave, the murmur of the bee;
Still slowly pass'd the melancholy day,
And still the stranger wist not where to stray.
The world was sad! the garden was a wild!
And man, the hermit, sigh'd-till woman smiled!
True, the sad power to generous hearts may bring Delirious anguish on his fiery wing;
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