WHILST Some affect the sun, and some the shade,
Some flee the city, some the hermitage;
Their aims as various, as the roads they take
In journeying through life;-the task be mine
To paint the gloomy horrors of the tomb;
Th' appointed place of rendezvous, where all
These travellers meet.--Thy succours I implore,
Eternal king! whose potent arm sustains
The keys of hell and death.— -The Grave-dread
thing!

Men shiver when thou'rt named: Nature, appall'd,
Shakes off her wonted firmness.-Ah! how dark
Thy long-extended realms, and rueful wastes !
Where nought but silence reigns, and night, dark
Dark as was chaos, ere the infant sun [night,
Was roll'd together, or had tried his beams
Athwart the gloom profound.The sickly taper,
By glimm'ring through thy low-brow'd misty vaults
(Furr'd round with mouldy damps, and ropy slime),
Lets fall a supernumerary horror,

And only serves to make thy night more irksome.
Well do I know thee by thy trusty yew,
Cheerless, unsocial plant! that loves to dwell
'Midst skulls and coffins, epitaphs and worms:
Where light-heel'd ghosts, and visionary shades,
Beneath the wan cold moon (as fame reports,)
Embodied, thick, perform their mystic rounds.
No other merriment, dull tree, is thine.

See yonder hallow'd fane ;-the pious work
Of names once famed, now dubious or forgot,
And buried 'midst the wreck of things which were;
There lie interr'd the more illustrious dead.
The wind is up: hark! how it howls! Methinks
Till now I never heard a sound so dreary:
Doors creak, and windows clap,and night's foul bird,
Rook'd in the spire, screams loud: the gloomy aisles
Black plaster'd, and hung round with shreds of
'scutcheons

And tatter'd coats of arms, send back the sound
Laden with heavier airs, from the low vaults,
The mansions of the dead.- -Roused from their
slumbers,

In grim array the grisly spectres rise,
Grin horrible, and, obstinately sullen,
Pass and repass, hush'd as the foot of Night.
Again the screech-owl shrieks: ungracious sound!
I'll hear no more; it makes one's blood run chill.
Quite round the pile, a row of reverend elms
(Coeval near with that) all ragged show,
Long lash'd by the rude winds. Some rift half down
Their branchless trunks; others so thin a-top,
That scarce two crows could lodge in the same tree.
Strange things, the neighbours say, have happen'd
here:

Wild shrieks have issued from the hollow tombs:
Dead men have come again, and walk'd about;

And the great bell has toll'd, unrung, untouch'd. (Such tales their cheer at wake or gossiping, When it draws near to witching time of night.)

Oft, in the lone church-yard at night I've seen, By glimpse of moonshine chequering through the The schoolboy, with his satchel in his hand, [trees, Whistling aloud to bear his courage up, And lightly tripping o'er the long flat stones (With nettles skirted, and with moss o'ergrown), That tell in homely phrase who lie below. Sudden he starts, and hears, or thinks he hears, The sound of something purring at his heels; Full fast he flies, and dares not look behind him, Till out of breath he overtakes his fellows Who gather round, and wonder at the tale Of horrid apparition, tall and ghastly, That walks at dead of night, or takes his stand O'er some new-open'd grave; and (strange to tell!) Evanishes at crowing of the cock.

Invidious grave!-how dost thou rend in sunder Whom love has knit, and sympathy made one! A tie more stubborn far than nature's band. Friendship! mysterious cement of the soul; Sweetener of life, and solder of society,

I owe thee much. Thou hast deserved from me
Far, far beyond what I can ever pay.

Oft have I proved the labours of thy love,
And the warm efforts of the gentle heart,
Anxious to please.-Oh! when my friend and I
In some thick wood have wander'd heedless on,
Hid from the vulgar eye, and sat us down
Upon the sloping cowslip-cover'd bank,
Where the pure limpid stream has slid along
In grateful errors through the underwood,
Sweet murmuring; methought the shrill-tongued
thrush

Mended his song of love; the sooty blackbird
Mellow'd his pipe, and soften'd every note:
The eglantine smell'd sweeter, and the rose
Assumed a dye more deep; whilst every flower
Vied with its fellow plant in luxury

Of dress- -Oh! then, the longest summer's day
Seem'd too, too much in haste: still the full heart
Had not imparted half: 'twas happiness
Too exquisite to last. Of joys departed,
Not to return, how painful the remembrance!

Beauty-thou pretty plaything, dear deceit, That steals so softly o'er the stripling's heart, And gives it a new pulse, unknown before, The grave discredits thee: thy charms expunged, Thy roses faded, and thy lilies soil'd, What hast thou more to boast of? Will thy lovers Flock round thee now, to gaze and do thee homage! Methinks I see thee with thy head low laid,

Whilst surfeited upon thy damask cheek
The high-fed worm, in lazy volumes roll❜d,
Riots unscared.- -For this, was all thy caution?
For this, thy painful labours at thy glass?

To improve those charms, and keep them in repair,
For which the spoiler thanks thee not. Foul feeder,
Coarse fare and carrion please thee full as well,
And leave as keen a relish on the sense.
Look how the fair one weeps !-the conscious tears
Stand thick as dew-drops on the bells of flowers:
Honest effusion! the swollen heart in vain
Works hard to put a gloss on its distress.

Sure 'tis a serious thing to die! My soul, What a strange moment must it be, when near Thy journey's end, thou hast the gulf in view! That awful gulf no mortal e'er repass'd To tell what's doing on the other side. Nature runs back, and shudders at the sight, And every life-string bleeds at thoughts of parting; For part they must: body and soul must part; Fond couple! link'd more close than wedded pair. This wings its way to its almighty source, The witness of its actions, now its judge; That drops into the dark and noisome grave, Like a disabled pitcher of no use.

Tell us, ye dead, will none of you, in pity
To those you left behind, disclose the secret ?
Oh! that some courteous ghost would blab it out;
What 'tis you are, and we must shortly be.
I've heard, that souls departed have sometimes
Forewarn'dmen of their death:-"Twas kindly done
To knock, and give the alarm.—But what means
This stinted charity ?-'Tis but lame kindness
That does its work by halves.-Why might you not
Tell us what 'tis to die? do the strict laws
Of your society forbid your speaking
Upon a point so nice ?—I'll ask no more:
Sullen, like lamps in sepulchres, your shine
Enlightens but yourselves. Well, 'tis no matter;
A very little time will clear up all,

And make us learn'd as you are, and as close.
Death's shafts fly thick :-)
-Here falls the village-
swain,

And there his pamper'd lord.-The cup goes round:
And who so artful as to put it by!
'Tis long since death had the majority;
Yet strange the living lay it not to heart.
See yonder maker of the dead man's bed,
The sexton, hoary-headed chronicle,
Of hard unmeaning face, down which ne'er stole
A gentle tear; with mattock in his hand
Digs through whole rows of kindred and acquaint-

ance,

By far his juniors.--Scarce a skull's cast up,
But well he knew its owner, and can tell
Some passage of his life.- -Thus hand in hand
The sot has walk'd with death twice twenty years;
And yet ne'er yonker on the green laughs louder,
Or clubs a smuttier tale :-When drunkards meet,
None sings a merrier catch, or lends a hand

More willing to his cup.-Poor wretch! he minds That soon some trusty brother of the trade [not Shall do for him what he has done for thousands.

Poor man!-how happy once in thy first state!
When yet but warm from thy great Maker's hand,
He stamp'd thee with his image, and, well pleased,
Smiled on his last fair work.-Then all was well.
Sound was the body, and the soul serene ;
Like two sweet instruments, ne'er out of tune,
That play their several parts.-Nor head, nor heart,
Offer'd to ache: nor was there cause they should;
For all was pure within: no fell remorse,
Nor anxious castings-up of what might be,
Alarm'd his peaceful bosom.-Summer seas
Show not more smooth, when kiss'd by southern
winds

Just ready to expire-scarce importuned,
The generous soil, with a luxurious hand,
Offer'd the various produce of the year,
And everything most perfect in its kind.
Blessed! thrice blessed days!-But ah! how short!
Bless'd as the pleasing dreams of holy men ;
But fugitive like those, and quickly gone.
Oh! slippery state of things.-What sudden turns!
What strange vicissitudes in the first leaf
Of man's sad history!--To-day most happy,
And ere to-morrow's sun has set, most abject.
How scant the space between these vast extremes!
Thus fared it with our sire:-Not long h' enjoy'd
His paradise.-Scarce had the happy tenant
Of the fair spot due time to prove its sweets,
Or sum them up, when straight he must be gone,
Ne'er to return again. And must he go?
Can nought compound for the first dire offence
Of erring man?- -Like one that is condemn'd,
Fain would he trifle time with idle talk,
And parley with his fate.But 'tis in vain.
Not all the lavish odours of the place,
Offer'd in incense, can procure his pardon,
Or mitigate his doom.--A mighty angel,
With flaming sword, forbids his longer stay,
And drives the loiterer forth; nor must he take
One last and farewell round.

Sure the last end Of the good man is peace !-How calm his exit ! Night-dews fall not more gently to the ground, Nor weary worn-out winds expire so soft. Behold him in the evening-tide of life, A life well-spent, whose early care it was His riper years should not upbraid his green : By unperceived degrees he wears away; Yet, like the sun, seems larger at his setting. (High in his faith and hopes) look how he reaches After the prize in view! and, like a bird That's hamper'd, struggles hard to get away: Whilst the glad gates of sight are wide expanded To let new glories in, the first fair fruits Of the fast-coming harvest.-Then, oh then! Each earth-born joy grows vile, or disappears, Shrunk to a thing of nought.-Oh! how he longs

D D

His faithfulness stands bound to see it done.
When the dread trumpet sounds, the slumb'ring dust
(Not unattentive to the call) shall wake:
And ev'ry joint possess its proper place,
With a new elegance of form, unknown

To its first state.- -Nor shall the conscious soul
Mistake its partner, but amidst the crowd
Singling its other half, into its arms
Shall rush with all the impatience of a man
That's new come home, and, having long been absent,
With haste runs over ev'ry different room,
In pain to see the whole. Thrice happy meeting!
Nor time, nor death, shall ever part them more.
'Tis but a night, a long and moonless night;
We make the grave our bed, and then are gone.
Thus, at the shut of ev'n, the weary bird
Leaves the wide air, and in some lonely brake
Cow'rs down, and dozes till the dawn of day,
Then claps his well-fledged wings, and bears
away.

Ir is singular that a subject of such beautiful unity, divisibility, and progressive interest as the description of the year, should not have been appropriated by any poet before Thomson*. Mr. Twining, the translator of Aristotle's Poetics, attributes the absence of poetry devoted to pure rural and picturesque description among the ancients, to the absence or imperfection of the art of landscape painting. The Greeks, he observes, had no Thomsons because they had no Claudes. Undoubtedly they were not blind to the beauties of natural scenery; but their descriptions of rural objects are almost always what may be called sensual descriptions, exhibiting circumstances of corporeal delight, such as breezes to fan the body, springs to cool the feet, grass to repose the limbs, or fruits to regale the taste and smell, rather than objects of contemplative pleasure to the eye and imagination. From the time of Augustus, when, according to

* Even Thomson's extension of his subject to the whole year seems to have been an after-thought, as he began with the last of the seasons. It is said that he conceived the first design of his Winter, from a poem on the same subject by a Mr. Rickleton. Vide the Censura Literaria, vol. ii. where there is an amusing extract from the first and second edition of Thomson's Winter. I have seen an English poem, intitled The Seasons, which was published earlier (I think) than those of Thomson; but it is so insignificant that it may be doubted if Thomson ever heard of it.

[ He tells us so himself in one of his early letters. See Memoir of Thomson in Aldine Poets, p. xvii. The recovery of Rickleton's poem would be an addition to our poetry, for Thomson speaks of its many masterly strokes.]

| Pliny, landscape painting was first cultivated, picturesque images and descriptions of prospects seem to have become more common. But on the whole there is much more studied and detailed description in modern than in ancient poetry. There is besides in Thomson a pure theism, and a spirit of philanthropy, which, though not unknown to classic antiquity, was not familiar to its popular breast. The religion of the ancients was beautiful in fiction, but not in sentiment. It had revealed the most voluptuous and terrific agencies to poetry, but had not taught her to contemplate nature as one great image of Divine benignity, or her creatures as the objects of comprehensive human sympathy. Before popular poetry could assume this character, Christianity, philosophy, and freedom, must have civilised the human mind.

Habits of early admiration teach us all to look back upon this poet as the favourite companion of our solitary walks, and as the author who has first or chiefly reflected back to our minds a heightened and refined sensation of the delight which rural scenery affords us. The judgment | of cooler years may somewhat abate our estimation of him, though it will still leave us the essential features of his poetical character to abide the test of reflection. The unvaried pomp of his diction suggests a most unfavourable comparison with the manly and idiomatic simplicity of Cowper; at the same time the pervading spirit and feeling of his poetry is in general more bland and delightful than that of his great rival in rural description. Thomson seems to contemplate the creation with

an eye of unqualified pleasure and ecstacy, and to love its inhabitants with a lofty and hallowed feeling of religious happiness; Cowper has also his philanthropy, but it is dashed with religious terrors, and with themes of satire, regret, and reprehension. Cowper's image of nature is more curiously distinct and familiar. Thomson carries our associations through a wider circuit of speculation and sympathy. His touches cannot be more faithful than Cowper's, but they are more soft and select, and less disturbed by the intrusion of homely objects. Cowper was certainly much indebted to him; and though he elevates his style with more reserve and judgment than his predecessor, yet in his highest moments he seems to retain an imitative remembrance of him. It is almost stale to remark the beauties of a poem so universally felt the truth and genial interest with which he carries us through the life of the year; the harmony of succession which he gives to the casual phenomena of nature; his pleasing transition from native to foreign scenery; and the soul of exalted and unfeigned benevolence which accompanies his prospects of the creation. It is but equal justice to say, that amidst the feeling and fancy of the Seasons, we meet with interruptions of declamation, heavy narrative, and unhappy digression-with a parhelion eloquence that throws a counterfeit glow of expression on common-place ideas-as when he treats us to the solemnly ridiculous bathing of Musidora; or draws from the classics instead of nature; or, after invoking Inspiration from her

hermit-seat, makes his dedicatory bow to a patronising countess, or speaker of the House of Commonst. As long as he dwells in the pure contemplation of nature, and appeals to the universal poetry of the human breast, his redundant style comes to us as something venial and adventitious-it is the flowing vesture of the druid; and perhaps to the general experience is rather imposing but when he returns to the familiar narrations or courtesies of life, the same diction ceases to seem the mantle of inspiration, and only strikes us by its unwieldy difference from the common costume of expression. Between the period of his composing the Seasons and the Castle of Indolence, he wrote several works, which seem hardly to accord with the improvement and maturity of his taste exhibited in the latter production. To the Castle of Indolence he brought not only the full nature, but the perfect art, of a poet. The materials of that exquisite poem are derived originally from Tasso; but he was more immediately indebted for them to the Fairy Queen and in meeting with the paternal spirit of Spenser he seems as if he were admitted more intimately to the home of inspiration. There he redeemed the jejune ambition of his style, and retained all its wealth and luxury without the accompaniment of ostentation. Every stanza of that charming allegory, at least of the whole of the first part of it, gives out a group of images from which the mind is reluctant to part, and a flow of harmony which the ear wishes to hear repeated.

O MORTAL man, who livest here by toil, Do not complain of this thy hard estate; That like an emmet thou must ever moil, Is a sad sentence of an ancient date; And, certes, there is for it reason great ;

[* Thomson was admirable in description; but it always seemed to me that there was somewhat of affectation in his style, and that his numbers are sometimes not well harmonised. I could wish too, with Dr. Johnson, that he had confined himself to this country; for when he describes what he never saw, one is forced to read him with some allowances for possible misrepresentation. He was, however, a true poet, and his lasting fame has proved it.-COWER, Letter to Mrs. King, June 19th, 1788.

Thomson was an honour to his country and to mankind, and a man to whose writings I am under very particular obligations; for if I have any true relish for the beauties of nature, I may say with truth, that it was from Virgil and from Thomson that I caught it.-BEATUE to R. Arbuthnot.

The love of nature seems to have led Thomson to a cheerful religion; and a gloomy religion to have led Cowper to a love of nature. The one would carry his

For, though sometimes it makes thee weep and wail,

And curse thy star, and early drudge and late, Withouten that would come an heavier bale, Loose life, unruly passions, and diseases pale. fellow-men along with him into nature; the other flies to nature from his fellow-men. In chastity of diction however, and the harmony of blank verse, Cowper leaves Thomson immeasurably below him; yet I still feel the latter to have been the born poet.-COLERIDGE.]

[This is too true; but Thomson, we learn from Smollett, intended, had he lived, to have withdrawn the whole of these dedications-not from their poetic impropriety, however, but from the ingratitude of his patrons. To the Castle of Indolence, his latest, chastest, but not his best work, there is no dedication.]

[ He had slight obligations also to Alexander Barclay's Castle of Labour, and to a poem of Mitchell's on Indolence, which, with his own lazy way of life, gave occasion to this delightful allegorical poem, in which the manner he professed to imitate is perhaps the most perfect without servility ever made of any author. There is no imitation of Spenser to approach it in genius and in manner. Gilbert West has Spenser's style and his style only.]

In lowly dale, fast by a river's side,
With woody hill o'er hill encompass'd round,
A most enchanting wizard did abide,

Than whom a fiend more fell is no where found.
It was, I ween, a lovely spot of ground:
And there a season atween June and May,
Half prankt with spring, with summer half im-
brown'd,

A listless climate made, where, sooth to say,
No living wight could work, ne cared ev'n for play.

Was nought around but images of rest:
Sleeep-soothing groves, and quiet lawns between;
And flowery beds that slumberous influence kest,
From poppies breathed; and beds of pleasant green,
Where never yet was creeping creature seen.
Meantime unnumber'd glittering streamlets play'd,
And hurled every-where their waters sheen ;
That, as they bicker'd through the sunny glade,
Though restless still themselves, a lulling murmur
made.

Join'd to the prattle of the purling rills, Were heard the lowing herds along the vale, And flocks loud-bleating from the distant hills, And vacant shepherds piping in the dale: And now and then sweet Philomel would wail, Or stock-doves plain amid the forest deep, That drowsy rustled to the sighing gale; And still a coil the grasshopper did keep; Yet all these sounds yblent inclined all to sleep.

Full in the passage of the vale, above, A sable, silent, solemn forest stood; Where nought but shadowy forms were seen to As Idless fancied in her dreaming mood: [move And up the hills, on either side, a wood Of blackening pines, aye waving to and fro, Sent forth a sleepy horror through the blood; And where this valley winded out, below, The murmuring main was heard, and scarcely heard, to flow.

A pleasing land of drowsy-head it was,

Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye; And of gay castles in the clouds that pass, For ever flushing round a summer-sky : There eke the soft delights, that witchingly Instil a wanton sweetness through the breast, And the calm pleasures, always hover'd nigh; But whate'er smack'd of noyance, or unrest, Was far, far off expell'd from this delicious nest.

The landskip such, inspiring perfect ease, Where Indolence (for so the wizard hight) Close-hid his castle mid embowering trees, That half shut out the beams of Phoebus bright, And made a kind of checker'd day and night; Meanwhile, unceasing at the massy gate, Beneath a spacious palm, the wicked wight Was placed; and to his lute, of cruel fate, And labour harsh, complain'd, lamenting man's

estate.

Thither continual pilgrims crowded still,
From all the roads of earth that pass there by:
For, as they chaunced to breathe on neighbour-
ing hill,

The freshness of this valley smote their eye,
And drew them ever and anon more nigh;
Till clustering round th' enchanter false they hung,
Ymolten with his syren melody;

While o'er th' enfeebling lute his hand he flung, And to the trembling chords these tempting verses [sung:

"Behold! ye pilgrims of this earth, behold!
See all but man with unearn'd pleasure gay:
See her bright robes the butterfly unfold,
Broke from her wintry tomb in prime of May!
What youthful bride can equal her array ?
Who can with her for easy pleasure vie?
From mead to mead with gentle wing to stray,
From flower to flower on balmy gales to fly,
Is all she has to do beneath the radiant sky.

"Behold the merry minstrels of the morn,
The swarming songsters of the careless grove,
Ten thousand throats! that from the flowering
thorn,

Hymn their good God, and carol sweet of love, Such grateful kindly raptures them emove : They neither plough, nor sow: ne, fit for flail, E'er to the barn the nodding sheaves they drove Yet theirs each harvest dancing in the gale, Whatever crowns the hill, or smiles along the vale.

"Outcast of nature, man! the wretched thrall
Of bitter dropping sweat, of sweltry pain,
Of cares that eat away thy heart with gall,
And of the vices, an inhuman train,
That all proceed from savage thirst of gain :
For when hard-hearted Interest first began
To poison earth, Astræa left the plain ;
Guile, violence, and murder seized on man,
And, for soft milky streams, with blood the rivers

ran.

"Come, ye, who still the cumberous load of life
Push hard up hill; but as the furthest steep
You trust to gain, and put an end to strife,
Down thunders back the stone with mighty sweep,
And hurls your labours to the valley deep,
For-ever vain: come, and, withouten fee,
I in oblivion will your sorrows steep,
Your cares, your toils, will steep you in a sea
Of full delight: O come, ye weary wights, to me!

"With me, you need not rise at early dawn,
To pass the joyless day in various stounds:
Or, louting low, on upstart fortune fawn,
And sell fair honour for some paltry pounds;
Or through the city take your dirty rounds,
To cheat, and dun, and lie, and visit pay,
Now flattering base, now giving secret wounds:
Or prowl in courts of law for human prey.
In venal senate thieve, or rob on broad highway.