Forbids, and leads me to the mountain brow,
Where sits the shepherd on the grassy turf,
Inhaling, healthful, the descending sun.
Around him feeds his many-bleating flock,
Of various cadence; and his sportive lambs,
This way and that convolv'd, in friskful glee,
Their frolics play. And now the sprightly race
Invites them forth; when swift, the signal given,
They start away, and sweep the massy mound
That runs around the hill; the rampart once
Of iron war, in ancient barbarous times,
When disunited Britain ever bled,
Lost in eternal broil; ere yet she grew
To this deep-laid indissoluble state,
Where wealth and commerce lift their golden heads,
And, o'er our labours, liberty and law,
Impartial, watch; the wonder of a world!
What is this mighty breath, ye sages, say,
That, in a powerful language, felt, not heard,
Instructs the fowls of heaven, and thro' their breasts
These arts of love diffuses? What, but God,
Inspiring God! who, boundless Spirit all,
And unremitting energy, pervades,
Adjusts, sustains, and agitates, the whole.
He ceaseless works alone; and yet alone
Seems not to work; with such perfection fram'd
Is this complex stupendous scheme of things.
But, though conceal'd, to ev'ry purer eye
Th' informing Author in his works appears.
Chief, lovely Spring, in thee and thy soft scenes,
The smiling God is seen; while water, earth,
And air, attest his bounty; which exalts
The brute creation to this finer thought,
And annual melts their undesigning hearts
Profusely thus in tenderness and joy.
Still let my song a nobler note assume,
And sing th' infusive force of Spring on man.
When heaven and earth, as if contending, vie
To raise his being and serene his soul,
Can he forbear to join the gen'ral smile
Of nature ? Can fierce passions vex his breast,
While ev'ry gale is peace, and ev'ry grove
Is melody? Hence from the bounteous walks
Of flowing Spring, ye sordid sons of earth,
Hard, and unfeeling of another's woe;
Or only lavish to yourselves; away!
But come, ye gen'rous minds, in whose wide thought,
Of all his works, creative bounty burns
With warmest beam, and on your open front
And lib'ral eye sits, from his dark retreat
Inviting modest Want. Nor till invok'd
Can restless goodness wait: your active search
Leaves no cold wintry corner unexplor❜d:
Like silent-working Heaven, surprising oft
The lonely heart with unexpected good.
For you the roving spirit of the wind
Blows Spring abroad: for you the teeming clouds
Descend in gladsome plenty o'er the world;
And the sun sheds his kindest rays for you,
Ye flower of human race! In these green days,
Reviving Sickness lifts her languid head:
Life flows afresh; and young-ey'd Health exalts
The whole creation round.`
The sunny glade, and feels an inward bliss
Spring o'er her heart, beyond the power of kings
To purchase. Pure serenity apace
Induces thought and contemplation still.
By swift degrees the love of nature works,
And warms the bosom; till, at last sublim'd
To rapture and enthusiastic heat,
We feel the present Deity, and taste
The joy of God to see a happy world!
These are the sacred feelings of thy heart,
Thy heart inform'd by reason's purer ray,
O Lyttelton, the friend! thy passions thus
And meditations vary, as, at large,
Courting the Muse, thro' Hagley Park thou stray'st,
Thy British Tempee! There along the dale,
With woods o'erhung, and shagg'd with mossy rocks,
Whence on each hand the gushing waters play,
And down the rough cascade white dashing fall,
Or gleam in lengthen'd vista through the trees,
You silent steal; or sit beneath the shade
Of solemn oaks, that tuft the swelling mounts
Thrown graceful round by nature's careless hand,
And pensive listen to the various voice
Of rural peace: the herds, the flocks, the birds,
The hollow-whisp'ring breeze, the plaint of rills,
That, purling down amid the twisted roots
Which creep around, their dewy murmurs shake
On the sooth'd ear. From these abstracted, oft
You wander through the philosophic world,
Where in bright train continual wonders rise,
Or to the curious or the pious eye.
And oft, conducted by historic truth,
You tread the long extent of backward time,
Planning, with warm benevolence of mind,
And honest zeal, unwarp'd by party rage,
Britannia's weal; how from the venal gulf
To raise her virtue, and her arts revive.
Or, turning thence thy view, these graver thoughts
The muses charm; while, with sure taste refin'd,
You draw th' inspiring breath of ancient song,
Till nobly rises, emulous, thy own.
Perhaps thy lov'd Lucinda shares thy walk,
With soul to thine attun'd. Then nature all
Wears to the lover's eye a look of love;
And all the tumult of a guilty world,
Tost by ungen'rous passions, sinks away.
The tender heart is animated peace;
And, as it pours its copious treasures forth,
In varied converse, soft'ning every theme,
You, frequent pausing, turn, and from her eyes,
Where meeken'd sense, and amiable grace,
And lively sweetness, dwell, enraptur'd drink
That nameless spirit of ethereal joy,
Unutterable happiness! which love
Alone bestows, and on a favour'd few.
Meantime you gain the height, from whose fair brow
The bursting prospect spreads immense around;
And snatch'd o'er hill, and dale, and wood, and lawn,
And verdant field, and dark'ning heath between,
And villages embosom'd soft in trees,
And spiry towns by surging columns mark'd
Of household smoke, your eye excursive roams,
Wide-stretching from the hall, in whose kind haunt
The hospitable genius lingers still,
To where the broken landscape, by degrees
Ascending, roughens into rigid hills,
O'er which the Cambrian mountains, like far clouds
That skirt the blue horizon, dusky rise.
Flush'd by the spirit of the genial year,
Now from the virgin's cheek a fresher bloom
Shoots, less and less, the live carnation round.
Her lips blush deeper sweets: she breathes of youth.
The shining moisture swells into her eyes
In brighter flow: her wishing bosom heaves
With palpitations wild: kind tumults seize
Her veins and all her yielding soul is love.
From the keen gaze her lover turns away,
Full of the dear ecstatic power, and sick
With sighing languishment. Ah! then, ye fair!
Be greatly cautious of your sliding hearts.
Dare not the infectious sigh, the pleading look,
Downcast and low, in meek submission dress'd,
But full of guile. Let not the fervent tongue,
Prompt to deceive, with adulation smooth,
Gain on your purpos'd will. Nor in the bower,
Where woodbines flaunt, and roses shed a couch,
While evening draws her crimson curtains round,
Trust your soft minutes with betraying man.
And let the aspiring youth beware of love;
Of the smooth glance beware; for tis too late,
When on his heart the torrent-softness pours.
Then wisdom prostrate lies, and fading fame
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