But like a hawk encumber'd with his hood, Explaining metaphysics to the nationI wish he would explain his Explanation. You, Bob! are rather insolent, you know, At being disappointed in your wish To supersede all warblers here below. And be the only Blackbird in the dish; And then you overstrain yourself, or so, And tumble downward like the flying fish Gasping on deck, because you soar too high, Bob, And fall for lack of moisture quite a-dry, Bob! And Wordsworth, in a rather long “ Excursion" (I think the quarto holds five hundred pages), Has given a sample from the vasty version Of his new system to perplex the grown To deem as a most logical conclusion, That poesy has wreaths for you alone; There is a narrowness in such a notion. Which makes me wish you'd change your lakes for ocean. I would not imitate the petty thought, Nor coin my self-love to so base a vice. For all the glory your conversion brought, Since gold alone should not have been its price, You have your salary; was 't for that you wrought? And Wordsworth has his place in the Excise. You're shabby fellows-true-but poets still, And duly seated on the immortal hill. Your bays may hide the baldness of your brows Perhaps some virtuous blushes ;-let them go To you I envy neither fruit nor boughsAnd for the fame you would engross below, The field is universal, and allows Scope to all such as feel the inherent glow; Scott, Rogers, Campbell, Moore and Crabbe will try 'Gainst you the question with posterity. For me, who, wandering with pedestrian Muses, Contend not with you on the winged steed, I wish your fate may yield ye, when she chooses, The fame you envy, and the skill you need ; And recollect a poet nothing loses In giving to his brethren their full meed Of merit, and complaint of present days Is not the certain path to future praise. He that reserves his laurels for posterity (Who does not often claim the bright reversion) Has generally no great crop to spare it, he The blood of monarchs with his prophecies. Or be alive again-again all hoar With time and trials, and those helpless eyes, And heartless daughters-worn—and pale-and poor; Would he adore à sultan ? he obey Cold-blooded, smooth-faced, placid miscreant! Dabbling its sleek young hands in Erin's gore And thus for wider carnage taught to pant, Transferr'd to gorge upon a sister shore, The vulgarest tool that Tyranny could want, With just enough of talent, and no more, To lengthen fetters by another fix'd, And offer poison long already mix'd. An orator of such set trash of phrase Nor foes-all nations-condescend to smile; Not even a sprightly blunder's spark can blaze From that Ixion grindstone's ceaseless toil, That turns and turns to give the world a notion Of endless torments and perpetual motion. A bungler even in its disgusting trade, And botching, patching, leaving still behind Something of which its masters are afraid, States to be curb'd, and thoughts to be confined, Conspiracy or Congress to be made― Cobbling at manacles for all mankind A tinkering slave-maker, who mends old chains, With God and man's abhorrence for its gains. If we may judge of matter by the mind, Emasculated to the marrow It Hath but two objects, how to serve, and bind, Brenta) I was most ready to return a blow, And would not brook at all this sort of thing In my hot youth-when George the Third was King. But now at thirty years my hair is gray(I wonder what it will be like at forty? I thought of a peruke the other day--) My heart is not much greener; and, in short, I Have squander'd my whole summer while 't was May, And feel no more the spirit to retort; I Have spent my life, both interest and principal, And deem not, what I deem'd, my soul invincible. No more--no more--Oh! never more on me The freshness of the heart can fall like dew, Which out of all the lovely things we see Extracts emotions beautiful and new, |