While he remembers with a sigh The comforts of his home. Youth comes; the toils and cares of life Where shall the tired and harass'd heart Life's summer prime of joy! Maturer Manhood now arrives, And other thoughts come on, But with the baseless hopes of Youth Its generous warmth is gone; Cold calculating cares succeed, The timid thought, the wary deed, The dull realities of Truth; Back on the past he turns his eye, Remembering with an envious sigh The happy dreams of Youth. So reaches he the latter stage Of this our mortal pilgrimage, With feeble step and slow; New ills that latter stage await, And old Experience learns too late That all is vanity below. Life's vain delusions are gone by, Its idle hopes are o'er, Yet age remembers with a sigh The days that are no more. 1798. 1793. REMEMBRANCE. The remembrance of Youth is a sigh.-ALI. MAN hath a weary pilgrimage As through the world he wends, On every stage from youth to age Still discontent attends; With heaviness he casts his eye Upon the road before, And still remembers with a sigh The days that are no more. To school the little exile goes, Torn from his mother's arms,What then shall soothe his earliest woes, When novelty hath lost its charms, Condem'd to suffer through the day Restraints which no rewards repay, And cares where love has no concern: Hope lengthens as she counts the hours Before his wish'd return. From hard controul and tyrant rules, The unfeeling discipline of schools, In thought he loves to roam, And tears will struggle in his eye THE SOLDIER'S WIFE. DACTYLICS. WEARY way-wanderer, languid and sick at heart, Travelling painfully over the rugged road, Wild-visaged Wanderer! ah for thy heavy chance! Sorely thy little one drags by thee bare-footed, Cold is the baby that hangs at thy bending back, Meagre and livid and screaming its wretchedness. Woe-begone mother, half anger, half agony, As over thy shoulder thou lookest to hush the babe, Bleakly the blinding snow beats in thy hagged face. Thy husband will never return from the war again, Cold is thy hopeless heart even as Charity!— Cold are thy famish'd babes.-God help thee, widowed One! THE WIDOW. SAPPHICS. 1795. COLD was the night wind, drifting fast the snow fell, Wide were the downs and shelterless and naked, When a poor Wanderer struggled on her journey, Weary and way-sore. This stanza was supplied by S. T. COLERIDGE. Thou tedious herald of more tedious prayers, Say, hast thou ever summoned from his rest Or roused one pious transport in the breast? I love the bell, that calls the poor to pray, And all the rustic train are gather'd round, And when, dim shadowing o'er the face of day, The mantling mists of even-tide rise slow, As through the forest gloom I wend my way, The minster curfew's sullen voice I know, And pause, and love its solemn toll to hear, As inade by distance soft it dies upon the ear. Nor with an idle nor unwilling ear Do I receive the early passing-bell; When I lie listening to the dead man's knell, But thou, memorial of monastic gall! The prayer that trembles on a yawn to heaven! And this Dean's gape, and that Dean's nasal tone, And Roman rites retain'd, though Roman faith be flown. 1793. TO HYMEN. GoD of the torch, whose soul-illuming flame Beams brightest radiance o'er the human heart, Of many a woe the cure, Of many a joy the source; To thee I sing, if haply may the Muse Pour forth the song unblamed from these dull haunts, Where never beams thy torch To cheer the sullen scene. I pour the song to thee, though haply doom'd Alone and unbeloved to waste my days, Though doom'd perchance to die Alone and unbewail'd. Yet will the lark albeit in cage enthrall'd When high in heaven she hears the caroling, Friend to each better feeling of the soul, To join thy happy train. Lured by the splendour of thy sacred torch, To wear thy flowery chain. And chasten'd Friendship comes, whose mildest sway Parent of every bliss, the busy hand Will paint the wearied labourer at that hour, WRITTEN ON SUNDAY MORNING. Go thou and seek the House of Prayer! Wakes not my soul to zeal, Like the wild music of the wind-swept grove. Or where the cloud-suspended rain Or when reclining on the cliffs huge height The primrose bank shall there dispense Go thou and seek the House of Prayer! I to the Woodlands bend my way, And meet RELIGION there! She needs not haunt the high-arch'd dome to pray, Where storied windows dim the doubtful day: With LIBERTY she loves to rove, Wide o'er the heathy hill or cowslipt dale; Or seek the shelter of the embowering grove, Or with the streamlet wind along the vale. Him Famine hath not tamed, The tamer of the brave; Him Winter hath not quell'd; When man by man his veteran troops sunk down, He held undaunted on; Borne on a litter to the fight he goes. Go, iron-hearted King! Full of thy former fame. Think how the humbled Dane Crouch'd to thy victor sword; Think how the wretched Pole Resign'd his conquer'd crown; Go, iron-hearted King! Let Narva's glory swell thy haughty breast,The death-day of thy glory, Charles, hath dawn'd |