Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub

When threatening tides of rage and anger rife,
Ufurp the throne, and reafon's fway defpife,
When in the feats of life this tempeft reigns,
Beats through the heart, and drives along the veins;
See; eloquence with force perfuafive binds

The reflefs waves, and charms the warring winds,
Refiftless bids tumultuous uproar cease,

Recalls the calm, and gives the bofom peace.
Did not the mind, on heavenly joy intent,
The various kinds of harmony invent?
She the theorbo, fhe the viol found,
And all the moving melody of found?

She gave to breathing tubes a power unknown,
To fpeak infpir'd with accents not their own;
Taught tuneful fons of mufic how to fing,
How, by vibrations of th' extended string,
And manag'd impulfe on the fuffering air,
T'extort the rapture, and delight the ear..
See, how celeftial reafon does command
The ready pencil in the painter's hand;
Whofe ftrokes affect with nature's felf to vie,
And with falfe life amufe the doubtful eye :
Behold the strong emotions of the mind
Exerted in the eyes, and in the face defign’d..
Such is the artift's wondrous power, that we
Ev'n pictur'd fouls and colour'd paffions fee,
Where without words (peculiar eloquence)
The bufy figures fpeak their various fenfe.
What living face does more distress or woe,
More finish'd frame, confufion, horror, know,

390

370

375

380

585

Than what the mafters of the pencil shew?

Mean

Mean time the chizel with the pencil vies;
The fifter arts dispute the doubtful prize.
Are human limbs, evʼn in their vital state,
More juft and ftrong, more free and delicate,
Than Buonorota's curious tools create?

He to the rock can vital instincts give,

[merged small][ocr errors]

Which thus transform'd can rage, rejoice, or grieve:
His skilful hand does marble veins infpire
Now with the lover's, now the hero's fire;

So well th' imagin'd actors play their part,
The filent hypocrites fuch power exert,

400

That paffions, which they feel not, they bestow, Affright us with their fear, and melt us with their woe.

There Niobe leans weeping on her arm :

How her fad looks and beauteous forrow charın!

See, here a Venus foft in Parian stone;

A Pallas there to ancient fables known;

That from the rock arofe, not from the main,

This not from Jove's, but from the sculptor's brain.
Admire the carver's fertile energy,

With ravish'd eyes his happy offspring fee.
What beauteous figures by th' unrival'd art
Of British Gibbons from the cedar ftart!
He makes that tree unnative charms affume,
Ufurp gay honours, and another's bloom;
The various fruits, which different climates bear,
And all the pride the fields and gardens wear;
While from unjuicy limbs without a root
New buds devis'd, and leafy branches, fhoot.
As human kind can by an act direct,
Perceive and know, then reafon and reflect:

410

415

420

So the Self-moving Spring has power to chuse,
These methods to reject, and those to use;
She can defign and profecute an end,
Exert her vigour, or her act fufpend;

425

Free from the infults of all foreign power,

She does her godlike liberty secure;

Her right and high prerogative maintains,

430

Impatient of the yoke, and scorns coercive chains;

She can her airy train of forms disband,

And makes new levees at her own command;
O'er her ideas fovereign fhe prefides,
At pleasure these unites, and those divides.
The ready phantoms at her nod advance,
And form the busy intellectual dance ;
While her fair fcenes to vary, or fupply,
She fingles out fit images, that lie
In memory's records, which faithful hold
Objects immenfe in fecret marks inroll'd;
The fleeping forms at her command awake,
And now return, and now their cells forfake,
On active Fancy's crowded theatre,

435

440

As fhe directs, they rife or disappear.

445

Objects, which through the fenfes make their way,

And juft impreffions to the foul convey,

Give her occafion firft herfelf to move,

And to exert her hatred, or her love;
Ideas, which to fome impulfive feem,

450

Act not upon the mind, but that on them.

When the to foreign objects audience gives,

Their ftrokes and motions in the brain perceives,

As

As thefe perceptions, we ideas name,
From her own power and active nature came,
So when difcern'd by intellectual light,
Herfelf her various paffions does excite,
To ill her hate, to good her appetite;
To thun the first, the latter to procure,
She chufes means by free elective power;
She can their various habitudes furvey,

455

460

Debate their fitness, and their merit weigh,

And, while the means fuggefted fhe compares,
She to the rivals this or that prefers.

By her fuperior power the reasoning foul

465

Can each reluctant appetite control;

Can every paffion rule, and every sense,

Change Nature's course, and with her laws difpense; Our breathing to prevent, fhe can arreft

470

Th' extenfion, or contraction, of the breaft;
When pain'd with hunger, we can food refufe,

And wholefome abftinence, or famine chufe.

Can the wild beaft his inftinct disobey,
And from his jaws releafe the captive prey?
Or hungry herds on verdant paftures lie,
Mindlefs to eat, and refolute to die?
With heat expiring, can the panting hart
Patient of thirft from the cool ftream depart?
Can brutes at will imprison'd breath detain ?
Torment prefer to eafe, and life difdain?

From all restraint, from all compulsion free,
Unforc'd, and unneceffitated, we
Ourselves determine, and our freedom prove,
When this we fly, and to that object move.

475

480

Had

48'5

Had not the mind a power to will and chufe,

One object to embrace, and one refuse;
Could she not act, or not her act fufpend,
As it obstructed, or advanc'd her end ;

Virtue and Vice were names without a caufe,

This would not Hate deserve, nor that Applaufe; 490

Juftice in vain has high tribunals rear'd,

495

Whom can her sentence punish, whom reward?
If impious children should their father kill,
Can they be wicked, when they cannot will;
When only causes foreign and unfeen
Strike with refiftlefs force the springs within,
Whence in the engine man all motion must begin?
Are vapours guilty, which the vintage blast?
Are ftorms profcrib'd, which lay the foreft wafte?
Why lies the wretch then tortur'd on the wheel,
If forc'd to treafon, or compell'd to steal?
Why does the warrior, by aufpicious fate
With laurels crown'd, and clad in robes of ftate,
In triumph ride amidst the gazing throng
Deaf with applaufes, and the Poet's fong;
If the victorious, but the brute machine
Did only wreaths inevitable win,

And no wife choice or vigilance has shown,
Mov'd by a fatal impulfe, not his own?

Should trains of atoms human fenfe impel,
Though not fo fierce, fo ftrong, fo vifible,
As foldiers arin'd, and do not men arreft
With clubs upheld and daggers at their breaft;
Yet means compulfive are not plainer shown,

When ruffians drive, or conquerors drag us on ;

[ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]
« ПредишнаНапред »