*

Nor yet will every soil with equal stores Fresh pleasure, unreprov’d. Nor thence partakes Repay the tiller's labour; or attend

Fresh pleasure only: for the attentive mind, His will, obsequious, whether to produce By this harmonious action on her powers, The olive or the laurel.

Becomes herself harmonious: wont so oft
In outward things to meditate the charm

Of sacred order, soon she seeks at home
Oh! blest of Heaven, whom not the languid To find a kindred order, to exert

songs

Within herself this elegance of love, Of Luxury, the syren! not the bribes

This fair inspir’d delight: her temper'd powers Of sordid Wealth, nor all the gaudy spoils Refine at length, and every passion wears Of pageant Honour, can seduce to leave A chaster, milder, more attractive mien. Those ever-blooming sweets, which from the store But if to ampler prospects, if to gaze Of Nature fair Imagination culls

On Nature's form, where, negligent of all To charm the enliven’d soul! What though These lesser graces, she assumes the port

not all

Of that eternal majesty that weigh'd Of mortal offspring can attain the heights The world's foundations, if to these the mind Of envied life; though only few possess Exalts her daring eye; then mightier far Patrician treasures or imperial state;

Will be the change, and nobler. Would the Yet Nature's care, to all her children just,

forms With richer treasures and an ampler state, Of servile custom cramp her generous powers ? Endows at large whatever happy man

Would sordid policies, the barbarous growth Will deign to use them. His the city's pomp, Of ignorance and rapine, bow her down The rural honours his. Whate'er adorns To tame pursuits, to indolence and fear ? The princely dome, the column and the arch, Lo! she appeals to Nature, to the winds The breathing marbles and the sculptur'd gold, And rolling waves, the sun's unwearied course, Beyond the proud possessor's narrow claim, The elements and seasons: all declare His tuneful breast enjoys. For him, the spring For what the eternal Maker has ordain'd Distils her dews, and from the silken gem The powers of man: we feel within ourselves Its lucid leaves unfolds: for him, the hand His energy divine: he tells the heart, Of Autumn tinges every fertile branch

He meant, he made us to behold and love
With blooming gold, and blushes like the morn. What he beholds and loves, the general orb
Each passing hour sheds tribute from her wings; Of life and being: to be great like him,
And still new beauties meet his lonely walk, Beneficent and active. Thus the men
And loves unfelt attract him. Not a breeze Whom Nature's works can charm, with God
Flies o'er the meadow, not a cloud imbibes

himself
The setting sun's effulgence, not a strain Hold converse; grow familiar, day by day,
From all the tenants of the warbling shade With his conceptions, act upon his plan;
Ascends, but whence his bosom can partake And form to his, the relish of their souls.

Cotton.

Nathaniel Cotton ward im Jahre 1721 geboren; weiter ist Nichts über seine früheren Lebensumstände bekannt. Er studirte Medicin und liess sich als practischer Arzt in St. Alban's nieder, wo er zugleich Vorsteher eines Irrenhauses war, das er bis zu seinem 1788 erfolgten Tode mit segensreichem Erfolg verwaltete.

Cotton nimmt als Dichter zwar keinen sehr hohen Rang unter seinen Zeitgenossen ein, obwohl seine für die Jugend geschriebenen Visions mehrere Auflagen erlebten, seine Poesieen zeichnen sich aber durch Gemüthlichkeit, Einfachheit und Würde vortheilhaft aus, und unter seinen Miscellaneous poems finden sich mehrere die sich im Andenken seiner Nation erhalten haben, namentlich das hier mitgetheilte.

While conscience, like a faithful friend,
Shall through the gloomy vale attend,

And cheer our dying breath;

Shall, when all other comforts cease,
Like a kind angel whisper peace,

And smooth the bed of death.

M a son.

stu

William Mason, der Sohn eines Geistlichen ward 1725 zu Kingston upon Hull geboren, dirte Theologie zu Cambridge und bekleidete dann nach einander die Aemter eines Caplans des Königs, eines Pfarrers zu Aston und eines Pracentors zu York. Er starb 1797.

Mason's gesammelte Werke, welche zuerst 1796 3 Bde in 8. zu York erschienen und später wiederholt aufgelegt worden sind, enthalten Oden, Elegieen, zwei Trauerspiele in antiker Form Cataractus und Elfrida, ein didactisch descriptives Gedicht The English Garden u. A. m. Er nahm unter seinen Zeitgenossen einen hohen Rang als Dichter ein, den er jedoch mehr seinem eleganten Styl und seinem darstellenden Talent als anderen für einen Dichter nothwendigeren Eigenschaften zu verdanken hat; namentlich fehlt es ihm an Einfachheit und wirklicher Begeisterung; Mängel, die Geschmack und Bildung nicht zu ergänzen im Stande' sind. Dagegen muss rühmlichst bemerk: werden, dass er ein trefficher Prosaist und Kritiker und einer der Ersten war, die den Sklavenhandel bekämpften.

Ode on the Fate of Tyranny.

Ev'n mighty Kings, the heirs of empire wide,

Rising, with solemn state, and slow, Oppression dies: the Tyrant falls:

From their sable thrones below, The golden City bows her walls!

Meet, and insult thy pride. Jehovah breaks th' Avenger's rod.

What, dost thou our ghostly train, The Son of Wrath, whose ruthless hand

A flitting shadow light, and vain ? Hurl'd Desolation o'er the land,

Where is thy pomp, thy festive throng, Has run his raging race, has clos'd the scene of

Thy revel dance, and wanton sông ?

blood. Chiefs arm’d around behold their vanquish'd And calls her crawling brood, and bids them

Proud King! Corruption fastens on thy breast; Lord;

share the feast. Nor spread the guardian shield, nor lift the loyal

sword.

Oh Lucifer! thou radiant star;

Son of the Morn; whose rosy car He falls; and earth again is free.

Flam'd foremost in the van of day: Hark! at the call of Liberty,

How art thou fall’n, thou King of Light! All Nature lifts the choral song.

Hown fall’n from thy meridian height! The Fir-trees, on the mountain's head,

Who saidst the distant poles shall hear me, and Rejoice thro' all their pomp of shade;

obey. The lordly Cedars nod on sacred Lebanon :

High, o'er the stars, my sapphire throne shall Tyrant? they cry, since thy fell force is broke,

glow, Our proud heads pierce the skies, nor fear the

woodman's stroke.
And, as Jehovah's self, my voice the heav'ns

shall bow.
Hell, from her gulph profound,
Rouses at thine approach; and, all around, He spake, he died. Distain'd with gore,
Her dreadful notes of preparation sound. Beside yon yawning cavern hoar,
See, at the awful call,

See, where his livid corse is laid.
Her shadowy Heroes all,

The aged Pilgrim passing by,

dry;

Surveys him long with dubious eye;

Eternal Infamy shall blast thy name, And muses on his fate, and shakes his reverend And all thy sons shall share their impious Fa head,

ther's shame. Just heav'ns! is thus thy pride imperial gone? Is this poor heap of dust the King of Babylon ?

Rise, purple Slaughter! furious rise;

Unfold the terror of thine eyes; Is this the Man, whose nod

Dart thy vindictive shafts around: Made the Earth tremble: whose terrific rod

Let no strange land a shade afford, Levell’d her loftiest cities? Where He trod,

No conquer'd nations call them Lord; Famine pursu'd and frown'd;

Nor let their cities rise to curse the goodly Till Nature groaning round,

ground. Saw her rich realms transformed to deserts

For thus Jehovah swears; no Name, no Son,

No remnant shall remain of haughty Babylon. While at his crowded prison's gate, Grasping the keys of fate, Stood stern Captivity.

Thus saith the righteous Lord: Vain Man! behold thy righteous doom; My Vengeance shall unsheath the flaming sword; Behold each neighb’ring monarch's tomb; O'er all thy realms my fury shall be pour'd. The trophied arch, the breathing bust,

Where yon proud city stood, The laurel shades their sacred dust:

I'll spread the stagnant flood; While thou, vile Out-cast, on this hostile plain, And there the Bittern in the sedge shall lurk; Moulder'st, a vulgar corse, among the vulgar Moaning with sullen strain;

stain.

While, sweeping o'er the plain,

Destruction ends her work. No trophied arch, no breathing bust,

Yes, on mine holy mountain's brow, Shall dignify thy trampled dust:

I'll crush this proud Assyrian foe.
No laurel flourish o'er thy grave.

Th' irrevocable word is spoke.
For why, proud King! thy ruthless hand From Judah's neck the galling yoke
Hurl'd Desolation o'er the land,

Spontaneous falls, she shines with wonted state; And crush'd the subject race, whom Kings are Thus by Myself I swear, and what I swear is born to save:

Fate.

Warton.

Thomas Warton ward 1728 zu Basingstoke in Hampshire geboren, studirte in Oxford und erhielt daselbst, nachdem ihm die anderen akademischen Grade zu Theil geworden, die Professur der Poesie. Später trat er in den geistlichen Stand und bekleidete die Pfarrämter von Kiddington und Hill Farrame. 1785 wurde er poet laureate. Er starb 1790 in Oxford.

Warton hat viele Schriften hinterlassen; sein bedeutendstes Werk ist die Geschichte der englischen Poesie bis zu den Zeiten der Königin Elisabeth, eine überaus fleissige, stoffreiche, gelehrte und scharfsinnige, aber trockene und nur dem Manne vom Fach erspriessliche Arbeit. Als Dichter gehört er zu den Miscellaneous poets jener Tage; Oden, Lieder und Sonnette, bilden den Hauptinhalt der Sammlung seiner Poesieen welche zuerst London 1777 erschienen und später neu aufgelegt wurden. Er besass ein angenehmes lyrisches Talent, das zwar correct, aber nicht sehr originell, auf grosse Auszeichnung eben nicht Anspruch machen durfte.

Inscription in a Hermitage, at Ansley Mindful of disaster past,
Hall, in Warwickshire.

And shrinking at the northern blast

The sleety storm returning still, Beneath this stony roof reclin'd,

The morning hoar, and evening chill; I soothe to peace my pensive mind;

Reluctant comes the timid Spring And while, to shade my lowly cave,

Scarce a bee, with airy ring, Embowering elms their umbrage wave; Murmurs the blossom'd boughs around, And while the maple dish is mine,

That clothe the garden's southern bound: The beechen cup, unstain'd with wine;

Scarce a sickly straggling flower, I scorn the gay licentious crowd,

Decks the rough castle's rifted tower: Nor heed the toys that deck the proud. Scarce the hardy primrose peeps

From the dark dell's entangled steeps : Within my limits lone and still

O'er the fields of waving broom The black bird pipes in artless trill;

Slowly shoots the golden bloom: Fast by my couch, congenial guest,

And, but by fits, the furze-clad dale The wren has wove her mossy nest;

Tinctures the transitory gale. From busy scenes, and brighter skies,

While from the shrubbery's naked maze, To lurk with innocence, she flies:

Where the vegetable blaze Here hopes in safe repose to dwell,

Of Flora's brightest 'broidery shone, Nor aught suspects the sylvan cell.

Every chequer'd charm is flown;

Save that the lilac hangs to view At morn I take my custom'd round,

Its bursting gems in clusters blue. To mark how buds yon shrubby mound,

Scant along the ridgy land And every opening primrose count,

The beans their new-born ranks expand: That trimly paints my blooming mount; The fresh-turn'd soil with tender blades Or o'er the sculptures, quaint and rude,

Thinly the sprouting barley shades: That grace my gloomy solitude,

Fringing the forest's devious edge, I teach in winding wreaths to stray

Half rob'd appears the hawthorn hedge; Fantastic ivy's gadding spray.

Or to the distant eye displays

Weakly green its budding sprays. At within yon studious nook,

The swallow, for a moment seen, I ope my brass-embossed book,

Skims in haste the village green; Pourtray'd with many a holy deed

From the gray moor, on feeble wing, Of martyrs, crown'd with heavenly meed:

The screaming plovers idly spring : Then as my taper waxes dim,

The butterfly, gay-painted soon, Chaunt, ere I sleep, my measur'd hymn;

Explores awhile the tepid noon: And at the close, the gleams behold

And fondly trusts its tender dyes Of parting wings bedropt with gold.

To fickle suns, and flattering skies.

Fraught with a transient frozen shower, While such pure joys my bliss create, If a cloud should haply lower, Who but would smile at guilty state?

Sailing o'er the landscape dark, Who but would wish his holy lot

Mute on a sudden is the lark; In calm Oblivion's humble grot?

But when gleams the sun again Who but would cast his pomp away,

O'er the pearl-besprinkled plain, To take my staff, and amice gray;

And from behind his watery vail And to the world's tumultuous stage

Looks through the thin descending hail ; Prefer the blameless hermitage?

She mounts, and, lessening to the sight,
Salutes the blithe return of light,
And high her tuneful track pursues

Mid the dim rainbow's scatter'd hues.
Select Passages

Where in venerable rows from an Ode to the First of April.

Widely waving oaks enclose

The mote of yonder antique hall, With dalliance rude young Zephyr wooes Swarm the rooks with clamorous call; Coy May. Full oft with kind excuse

And to the toils of nature true, The boisterous boy the fair denies,

Wreath their capacious nests anew. Or with a scornful smile complies.

Musing through the lawny park,

eve,

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