DECAY OF PIETY

Attendance at church on prayer-days, Wednesdays and Fridays and Holidays, received a shock at the Revolution. It is now, however, happily reviving. The ancient people described in this Sonnet were among the last of that pious class. May we hope that the practice, now in some degree renewed, will continue to spread.

OFT have I seen, ere Time had ploughed

my cheek,

Matrons and Sires-who, punctual to the call Of their loved Church, on fast or festival Through the long year the house of Prayer

would seek:

By Christmas snows, by visitation bleak
Of Easter winds, unscared, from hut or hall
They came to lowly bench or sculptured stall,
But with one fervour of devotion meek.

I see the places where they once were known, And ask, surrounded even by kneeling crowds,

Is ancient Piety for ever flown?

Alas! even then they seemed like fleecy clouds

That, struggling through the western sky, have won

Their pensive light from a departed sun!

1827.

"SCORN NOT THE SONNET" Composed, almost extempore, in a short walk on the western side of Rydal Lake.

SCORN not the Sonnet; Critic, you have frowned,

Mindless of its just honours; with this key
Shakspeare unlocked his heart; the melody
Of this small lute gave ease to Petrarch's
wound;

A thousand times this pipe did Tasso sound;
With it Camöens soothed an exile's grief;
The Sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf
Amid the cypress with which Dante crowned
His visionary brow: a glow-worm lamp,
It cheered mild Spenser, called from Faery-
land

To struggle through dark ways; and, when a damp

Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand The Thing became a trumpet; whence he blew

Soul-animating strains-alas, too few!

1827.

FAIR Prime of life! were it enough to gild With ready sunbeams every straggling shower;

And, if an unexpected cloud should lower,
Swiftly thereon a rainbow arch to build
For Fancy's errands, then, from fields
half-tilled

Gathering green weeds to mix with poppy flower,

Thee might thy Minions crown, and chant thy power,

Unpitied by the wise, all censure stilled.
Ah! show that worthier honours are thy
due;

Fair Prime of life! arouse the deeper heart;
Confirm the Spirit glorying to pursue
Some path of steep ascent and lofty aim;
And, if there be a joy that slights the claim
Of grateful memory, bid that joy depart.
1827.

RETIREMENT

IF the whole weight of what we think and feel,

Save only far as thought and feeling blend
With action, were as nothing, patriot Friend!
From thy remonstrance would be no appeal ;
But to promote and fortify the weal

Of our own Being is her paramount end;
A truth which they alone shall compreher.d
Who shun the mischief which they cannot

heal.

Peace in these feverish times is sovereign bliss:

Here, with no thirst but what the stream can slake,

And startled only by the rustling brake, Cool air I breathe; while the unincumbered Mind

By some weak aims at services assigned To gentle Natures, thanks not Heaven amiss. 1827.

"THERE IS A PLEASURE IN POETIC PAINS"

THERE is a pleasure in poetic pains Which only Poets know;-'twas rightly said;

Whom could the Muses else allure to tread Their smoothest paths, to wear their lightest chains?

"WHEN PHILOCTETES IN THE

LEMNIAN ISLE"

WHEN Philoctetes in the Lemnian isle Like a form sculptured on a monument Lay couched; on him or his dread boat unbent

Some wild Bird oft might settle and begule The rigid features of a transient smile,

strains,

How oft the malice of one luckless word
Pursues the Enthusiast to the social board,
Haunts him belated on the silent plains!
Yet he repines not, if his thought stand
clear,

At last, of hindrance and obscurity,
Fresh as the star that crowns the brow of

morn;

Bright, speckless, as a softly-moulded tear The moment it has left the virgin's eye, Or rain-drop lingering on the pointed thorn. 1827.

RECOLLECTION OF THE PORTRAIT OF KING HENRY EIGHTH, TRINITY LODGE, CAMBRIDGE

THE imperial Stature, the colossal stride,
Are yet before me; yet do I behold
The broad full visage, chest of amplest
mould,

The vestments 'broidered with barbaric pride:

And lo! a poniard, at the Monarch's side, Hangs ready to be grasped in sympathy With the keen threatenings of that fulgent

eye,

Below the white-rimmed bonnet, far-descried.

Who trembles now at thy capricious mood? 'Mid those surrounding Worthies, haughty King,

We rather think, with grateful mind sedate, How Providence educeth, from the spring Of lawless will, unlooked-for streams of

good,

Which neither force shall check nor time abate! 1827.

Slackening the pains of ruthless banishment From his loved home, and from heroic tolli And trust that spiritual Creatures round move,

Griefs to allay which Reason cannot heal; Yea, veriest reptiles have sufficed to prove To fettered wretchedness, that no Bastile Is deep enough to exclude the light of love, Though man for brother man has ceased to feel. 1827.

"WHILE ANNA'S PEERS AND EARLY PLAYMATES TREAD" This is taken from the account given by Mi Jewsbury of the pleasure she derived, when b confined to her bed by sickness, from the animate object on which this Sonnet turns. WHILE Anna's peers and early playmates tread,

In freedom, mountain-turf and river's marge;

Or float with music in the festal barge: Rein the proud steed, or through the dance are led;

Her doom it is to press a weary bed-
Till oft her guardian Angel, to some charge
More urgent called, will stretch his wings
at large,

And friends too rarely prop the languid head,
Yet, helped by Genius-untired comforter,
The presence even of a stuffed Owl for bet
Can cheat the time; sending her fancy ou
To ivied castles and to moonlight skies,
Though he can neither stir a plume, nor
shout;

Nor veil, with restless film, his staring eyes. 1827.

TO THE CUCKOO

NOT the whole warbling grove in concert heard

"GO BACK TO ANTIQUE AGES, IF THINE EYES"

Go back to antique ages, if thine eyes
The genuine mien and character would trace
Of the rash Spirit that still holds her place,
Prompting the world's audacious vanities!
Go back, and see the Tower of Babel rise;
The pyramid extend its monstrous base,
For some Aspirant of our short-lived race,
Anxious an aery name to immortalize.
There, too, ere wiles and politic dispute
Gave specious colouring to aim and act,
See the first mighty Hunter leave the brute-
To chase mankind, with men in armies
packed

For his field-pastime high and absolute, While, to dislodge his game, cities are sacked! 1827.

Written at Rydal Mount. I could wish the last five stanzas of this to be read with the poem addressed to the skylark.

FANCY, who leads the pastimes of the glad, Full oft is pleased a wayward dart to throw Sending sad shadows after things not sad, Peopling the harmless fields with signs of

woe:

Beneath her sway, a simple forest cry Becomes an echo of man's misery.

1 See Note.

2 This line alludes to Sonnets which will be found in another Class.