For that from turbulence and heat Proceeds, from some uneasy seat This, this is holy; — while I hear And earth's precarious days. But list! though winter storms be nigh, Unchecked is that soft harmony: For all his creatures; and in Him, These Choristers confide. XXXI. UPON THE SAME OCCASION. DEPARTING Summer hath assumed An aspect tenderly illumed, The gentlest look of Spring; No faint and hesitating trill, Such tribute as to Winter chill The lonely redbreast pays! Clear, loud, and lively is the din, Nor doth the example fail to cheer Yet will I temperately rejoice; Wide is the range, and free the choice Which, haply, kindred souls may prize For deathless powers to verse belong, But some their function have disclaimed, Best pleased with what is aptliest framed To enervate and defile. Not such the initiatory strains In Britain's earliest dawn: Trembled the groves, the stars grew pale, While all-too-daringly the veil Of Nature was withdrawn! Nor such the spirit-stirring note When the live chords Alcæus smote, Inflamed by sense of wrong; Woe! woe to Tyrants! from the lyre And not unhallowed was the page By winged Love inscribed, to assuage The pangs of vain pursuit ; Love listening while the Lesbian Maid With finest touch of passion swayed Her own Æolian lute. ye who patiently explore The wreck of Herculanean lore, What rapture! could ye seize Some Theban fragment, or unroll That were, indeed, a genuine birth Of Genius from the dust: What Horace gloried to behold, What Maro loved, shall we enfold? Can haughty Time be just! XXXII. THE PILLAR OF TRAJAN. WHERE Towers are crushed, and unforbidden weeds A votive column, spared by fire and flood; — From death the memory of the Good and Brave. Ascend, with lineaments in air not lost : - So, pleased with purple clusters to entwine Some lofty elm-tree, mounts the daring vine; |