1 I know few more striking or more interesting proofs of the overwhelming influence which the study of the Greek and Roman classics exercised on the judgments, feelings, and imaginations of the literati of Europe at the commencement of the restoration of literature, than the passage in the Filocopo of Boccaccio: where the sage instructor, Racheo, as soon as the young prince and the beautiful girl Biancofiore had learned their letters, sets them to study the Holy Book, Ovid's Art of Love. 'Incominciò Racheo a mettere il suo officio in esecuzione con intera sollecitudine. E loro, in breve tempo, insegnato a conoscer le lettere, fece leggere il santo libro d'Ovvidio, nel quale il sommo poeta mostra, come i santi fuochi di Venere si debbano ne' freddi cuori accendere.' IN MISS E. TREVENEN'S ALBUM VERSE, pictures, music, thoughts both grave and gay, Remembrances away, of dear-loved friends On spotless page of virgin white displayed, Such should thine Album be, for such art thou, sweet maid! 1829. LOVE, HOPE, AND PATIENCE IN EDUCATION O'ER wayward childhood would'st thou hold firm rule, And sun thee in the light of happy faces; Love, Hope, and Patience, these must be thy graces, And in thine own heart let them first keep school. For as old Atlas on his broad neck places Heaven's starry globe, and there sustains. it ;-so Do these upbear the little world below Of Education, Patience, Love, and Hope. Methinks, I see them group'd in seemly show, The straiten'd arms upraised, the palms aslope, And robes that touching as adown they flow, Distinctly blend, like snow emboss'd in snow. O part them never! If Hope prostrate lie, Love too will sink and die. But Love is subtle, and doth proof derive From her own life that Hope is yet alive; And bending o'er, with soul-transfusing eyes, And the soft murmurs of the mother dove, Wooes back the fleeting spirit, and half supplies ; Thus Love repays to Hope what Hope first gave to Love. 'Twas all another, feature, look, and What is there in thee, Man, that can be frame, known?-And still, methought, I knew, it was the Dark fluxion, all unfixable by thought, A phantom dim of past and future same! FRIEND This riddling tale, to what does it belong? Is't history? vision? or an idle song? Or rather say at once, within what space Of time this wild disastrous change took place? AUTHOR Call it a moment's work (and such it seems) This tale's a fragment from the life of dreams; But say, that years matur'd the silent strife, And 'tis a record from the dream of life. ? 1830. HUMILITY THE MOTHER OF best, CHARITY And without scorn forgave :-Do thou the same. A wrong done to thee think a cat's-eye spark Thou wouldst not see, were not thine own heart dark. Thine own keen sense of wrong that thirsts for sin, Fear that the spark self-kindled from within, Which blown upon will blind thee with its glare, FRAIL creatures are we all! To be the Or smother'd stifle thee with noisome air. Clap on the extinguisher, pull up the blinds, Is but the fewest faults to have:Look thou then to thyself, and leave the And soon the ventilated spirit finds Its natural daylight. If a foe have kenn'd, Or worse than foe, an alienated friend, A rib of dry rot in thy ship's stout side, Think it God's message, and in humble pride With heart of oak replace it ;--thine the gains Give him the rotten timber for his pains! 1832. LOVE'S APPARITION AND EVANISHMENT AN ALLEGORIC ROMANCE LIKE a lone Arab, old and blind, Some caravan had left behind, Who sits beside a ruin'd well, Where the shy sand-asps bask and swell; And now he hangs his aged head aslant, And listens for a human sound-in vain! And now the aid, which Heaven alone can grant, LOVE'S BURIAL-PLACE Lady. If Love be dead Poet. And I aver it! Lady. Tell me, Bard! where Love lies buried? Poet. Love lies buried where 'twas born: Oh, gentle dame! think it no scorn To call thy bosom poor Love's Tomb. Upturns his eyeless face from Heaven to gain ;Even thus, in vacant mood, one sultry Here lies a Love that once seem'd hour, mine, Resting my eye upon a drooping But took a chill, as I divine, plant, With brow low-bent, within my garden bower, I sate upon the couch of camomile; Flitted across the idle brain, the while scope, In my own heart; or that, indeed a trance, Turn'd my eye inward-thee, O genial Hope, Love's elder sister! thee did I behold, Drest as a bridesmaid, but all pale and cold, And died at length of a Decline.' 1833. TO THE YOUNG ARTIST KAYSER OF KASERWERTH KAYSER! to whom, as to a second. Nature, or Nature's next-of-kin, the Hight Genius, hath dispensed the happy To cheer or soothe the parting friend's 'Alas!' With roseless cheek, all pale and cold Turning the blank scroll to a magic That, nursed in tenderest care, yet fades Thy natural gladness and eyes bright MY BAPTISMAL BIRTH-DAY GOD'S child in Christ adopted,--Christ my all, What that earth boasts were not lost cheaply, rather EPITAPHIUM TESTAMENTARIUM Τὸ τοῦ ΕΣΤΗΣΕ τοῦ ἐπιθανούς Epitaphium testamentarium αὐτόγραφον. Than forfeit that blest name, by which I Quæ linquam, aut nihil, aut nihili, au vix sunt mea. Sordes call |
