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Ann Yearsley, “On Mrs. Montagu”

ANN YEARSLEY

“On Mrs. MONTAGU”

 

Why boast, O arrogant, imperious man
Perfection so exclusive? are thy powers
Nearer approaching Deity? can’st thou solve
Questions which Infinity propounds,
Soar nobler flights, or dare immortal deeds                                                         5
Unknown woman, if she greatly dares
To use the powers assign’d to her? Active strength,
The boast of animals, is clearly thine;
By this upheld, thou think’st the lesson rare
That female virtues teach; and poor the height                                                    10
Which female wit obtains. The theme unfolds
Its ample maze, for MONTAGU befriends
The puzzled thought, and, blazing in the eye
Of boldest Opposition, strait presents
The soul’s best energies, her keenest powers,                                                      15
Clear, vigorous, enlighten’d; with firm wing
Swift she o’ertakes his Muse, which spread afar
Its brightest glories in the days of yore;
Lo! where she, mounting, spurns the stedfast earth,
And, failing on the cloud of science, bears                                                              20
The banner of Perfection —————-
Ask GALLIA’S mimic sons how strong her powers,
Whom flush’d with plunder from her SHAKESPEARE’S page,
She swift detects amid their dark retreats;
(Horrid as CACUS in their thievish dens)                                                                  25
Regains the trophies, bears in triumph back
The pilfer’d glories to wond’ring world.
So STELLA boasts, from her tale I learn’d;
With pride she told it, I with rapture heard.

O, MONTAGU! forgive me, if I sing                                                                    30
Thy wisdom temper’d with the milder ray
Of soft humanity, and kindness bland:
So wide its influence, that the bright beams
Reach the low vale where mists of ignorance lodge,
Strike on the innate spark which lay immers’d,                                                      35
Thick clogg’d, and almost quench’d in total night —
On me it fell, and cheer’d my joyless heart.

Unwelcome is the first bright dawn of light
To the dark soul; impatient, she rejects,
And fain wou’d push the heavenly stranger back;                                                  40
She loaths the cranny which admits the day:
Confus’d, afraid of the intruding guest;
Disturb’d, unwilling to receive the beam,
Which to herself her native darkness shews.

The effort rude to quench the cheering flame                                                45
Was mine, and e’en on STELLA cou’d I gaze
With sullen envy, and admiring pride,
Till, doubly roused by MONTAGU, the pair
Conspire to clear my dull, imprison’d sense,
And chase the mists which dimm’d my visual beam.                                           50

Oft as I trod my native wilds alone,
Strong gusts of thought woul’d rise, but rise to die;
The portals of swelling soul, ne’er op’d
By liberal converse, rude ideas strove
Awhile for vent, but found it not, and died.                                                           55
Thus rust the Mind’s best powers.  Yon starry orbs,
Majestic ocean, flowery vales, gay groves,
Eye-wasting lawns, and Heaven-attempting hills,
Which bound th horizon, and which curb the view:
All those, with beauteous imagery, awak’d                                                            60
My ravish’d soul to extacy untaught,
To all the transport the rapt sense can bear;
But all expir’d, for want of powers to speak;
All perish’d in the mind as soon as born,
Eras’d more quick than cyphers on the shore,                                                      65
O’er which the cruel waves, unheedful, roll.

Such timid rapture as young EDWIN seiz’d,
When his lone footsteps on the Sage obtrude,
Whose noble precept charm’d his wond’ring ear,
Such rapture fill’d LACTILLA’S vacant soul,                                                             70
When the bright Moralist, in softness drest,
Opes all the glories of the mental world,
Deigns to direct the infant thought, to prune
The budding sentiment, uprear the stalk
Of feeble fancy, bid idea live,                                                                                    75
Woo the abstracted spirit from its cares,
And gently guide her to the fences of peace.
Mine was that balm, and mine the grateful heart,
Which breathes its strength in tough, but timid strains.

NOTES:

Title Montagu Elizabeth Montagu (1718-1800), literary critic, writer, and patron of the arts.  She was a founding member of the Bluestockings, a group of intellectual women formed in the mid-eighteenth century (Britannica).

17 Muse “The inspiration of poetry or song” (OED).

19 spurns “To reject with contempt or disdain” (OED).

22 GALLIA’S mimic sons Ancient Latin word for France; a reference to French critics (OED).

23 SHAKESPEARE’S page A reference to Montagu’s most important work, An Essay on the Writing and Genius of Shakespear (1769).

25 CACUS Three-headed, fire-breathing Roman diety killed by Hercules in his own cave after stealing cattle (Britannica).

28 STELLA Yearsley’s poetic name for Hannah More (1745-1833), a poet, playwright, and member of the Bluestocking circle.  She became Yearsley’s most energetic patron until their falling out in 1787.

61 extacy “An exalted state of feeling which engrosses the mind to the exclusion of thought” (OED).

67 young EDWIN “See the Minstrel” [Author’s Note].  Edwin is the young poet of James Beattie’s (1785-1803) popular two-part poem The Minstrel (1771/1774).  One of the characters he encounters is a philosopher or “Sage” figure.

70 LACTILLA “The Author” [Author’s Note]. Yearsley’s poetic name for herself.

71 bright Moralist Most likely a reference to Elizabeth Montagu.

SOURCE:  Poems, on Several Occasions (London, 1785), pp. 101-106.  [Google Books]

Edited by Chloe Moody

Ann Yearsley, “Address to Friendship”

ANN YEARSLEY

“Address To Friendship”

FRIENDSHIP! thou noblest ardor of the soul!
Immortal essence! languor’s best support!
Chief dignifying proof of glorious man!
Firm cement of the world! endearing tie,
Which binds the willing soul, and brings along                                          5
Her chastest, strongest, and sublimest powers!

All else the dregs of spirit. Love’s soft flame,
Bewildering, leads th’ infatuated soul;
Levels, depresses, wraps in endless mists,
Contracts, dissolves, enervates and enslaves,                                            10
Relaxes, sinks, distracts, while Fancy fills
Th’inflaming draught, and aids the calenture.
Intoxicating charm! yet well refin’d
By Virtue’s brightening flame, pure it ascends,
As incense in its grateful circles mounts,                                                     15
Till, mixt and lost, with Thee it boasts thy name.

Thou unfound blessing! woo’d with eager hope,
As clowns the nightly vapour swift pursue,
And fain wou’d grasp to cheer their lonely way;
Vain the wide stretch, and vain the shorten’d breath,                               20
For, ah! the bright delusion onward flies,
While the sad swain deceiv’d, now cautious treads
The common beaten track, nor quits it more.

Not unexisting art thou, but so rare,
That delving souls ne’er find thee; ’tis to thee,                                              25
When found, if ever found, sweet fugitive,
The noble mind opes all her richest stores;
Thy firm, strong hold suits the courageous breast,
Where stubborn virtues dwell in secret league,
And each conspires to fortify the rest.                                                            30

Etherial spirits alone may hope to prove
Thy strong, yet soften’d rapture; soften’d more
When penitence succeeds to injury;
When, doubting pardon, the meek, pleading eye
On which the soul had once with pleasure dwelt,                                          35
Swims in the tear of sorrow and repentance.
The faultless mind with treble pity views
The tarnish’d friend, who feels the sting of shame;
’Tis then too little barely to forgive;
Nor can the soul rest on that frigid thought,                                                   40
But rushing swiftly from her Stoic heights,
With all her frozen feelings melted down
By Pity’s genial beams, she sinks, distrest,
Shares the contagion, and with lenient hand
Lifts the warm chalice fill’d with consolation.                                                   45

Yet Friendship’s name oft decks the crafty lip,
With seeming virtue clothes the ruthless soul;
Grief-soothing notes, well feign’d to look like Truth,
Like an insidious serpent softly creep
To the poor, guileless, unsuspecting heart,                                                      50
Wind round in wily folds, and sinking deep
Explore her sacred treasures, basely heave
Her hoard of woes to an unpitying world;
First sooths, ensnares, exposes, and betrays.
What art thou, fiend, who thus usurp’st the form                                             55
Of the soft Cherub? Tell me, by what name
The ostentatious call thee, thou who wreck’st
The gloomy peace of sorrow-loving souls?
Why thou art Vanity, ungenerous sprite,
Who tarnishest the action deem’d so great,                                                       60
And of soul-saving essence. But for thee,
How pure, how bright wou’d THERON’s virtues shine;
And, but that Thou art incorp’rate with the flame,
Which else wou’d bless where’er its beams illume,
My grateful spirit had recorded here                                                                   65
Thy splendid seemings. Long I’ve known their worth.

O, ’tis the deepest error man can prove,
To fancy joys disinterested can live,
Indissoluble, pure, unmix’d with self;
Why, ‘twere to be immortal, ‘twere to own                                                         70
No part but spirit in this chilling gloom.

My soul’s ambitious, and its utmost stretch
Wou’d be, to own a friend — but that’s deny’d.
Now, at this bold avowal, gaze, ye eyes,
Which kindly melted at my woe-fraught tale;                                                     75
Start back, Benevolence, and shun the charge;
Soft bending Pity, fly the sullen phrase,
Ungrateful as it seems. My abject fate
Excites the willing hand of Charity,
The momentary sigh, the pitying tear,                                                                 80
And instantaneous act of bounty bland,
To Misery so kind; yet not to you,
Bounty, or Charity, or Mercy mild,
The pensive thought applies fair Friendship’s name;
That name which never yet cou’d dare exist                                                        85
But in equality.

NOTES:

7 Dregs “The most worthless part or parts” (OED).

12 calenture “Burning passion, ardour, zeal” (OED).

41 Stoic Stoicism was a school of philosophy founded in Athens in the third century BC by Zeno of Citium.

56 Cherub An imaginary “being of a celestial or angelic order” (OED).

62 THERON “In Greek mythology, another name for the goddess Artemis. According to legend, Theron/Artemis made a wish in childhood to always remain a virgin and to assist women in childbirth” (Kerri Andrews, ed., The Collected Works of Ann Yearsley, vol. I, p. 388).

 SOURCE: Poems, on Several Occasions, 3rd edition (London, 1785), pp. 60-65. [HathiTrust]

Edited by Rafe Kassim

Anne Finch, “Cupid and Folly”

ANNE FINCH

“Cupid and Folly”
Imitated from the FRENCH

Cupid, ere depriv’d of Sight,
Young and apt for all Delight,
Met with Folly on the way,
As Idle, and as fond of Play.
In gay Sports the time they pass;                                                                   5
Now run, now wrestle on the Grass;
Their painted Wings then nimbly ply,
And ev’ry way for Mast’ry try:
‘Till a Contest do’s arise,
Who has won th’ appointed Prize.                                                                 10
Gentle Love refers the Case
To the next, that comes in Place;
Trusting to his flatt’ring Wiles,
And softens the Dispute with Smiles.
But Folly, who no Temper knows,                                                                  15
Words pursues with hotter Blows:
‘Till the Eyes of Love were lost,
Which has such Pain to Mortals cost.
Venus hears his mournful Crys,
And repeats ‘em, in the Skys,                                                                          20
To Jupiter in Council set,
With Peers for the Occasion met;
In her Arms the Boy she bears,
Bathing him in falling Tears;
And whilst his want of Eyes is shown,                                                            25
Secures the Judges by her Own.
Folly to the Board must come,
And hear the Tryal and the Doom;
Which Cytherea loudly prays
May be as heavy as the Case:                                                                          30
Which, when All was justly weigh’d,
Cupid’s Wings now useless made,
That a Staff, his Feet must guide,
Which wou’d still be apt to slide;
This Decree at last was read,                                                                            35
That Love by Folly shou’d be lead.

NOTES:

1 Cupid “Roman god of love” (Britannica), often rendered in iconography as blindfolded or blind.

3 Folly “Foolishness…unwise conduct” (OED).

19 Venus Roman goddess of love, mother of Cupid (Britannica).

21 Jupiter Roman god of the sky (Britannica).

29 Cytherea Another name for Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love.

SOURCE: Poems on Several Occasions (London, 1714), pp. 135-136. [HathiTrust]

 Edited by Hannah Heiden

Anonymous, “On Solitude”

ANONYMOUS

“On Solitude”

Hail, modest Solitude, instructive maid,
Still to thy vot’ry, still vouchsafe thine aid
Still imp my soul with meditation’s wings,
And lead me far from modern trifling things.
Before my view bid ages past unfold,                                                  5
And let me mingle with the great of old.
With kings and heroes, saints and sages stray,
And let their converse cheat the devious way.
Behold, already to my joyful eyes,
From various realms the mighty shades arise;                                  10
Who once the bulwark of their country stood,
And, to be great, determin’d to be good.
Great too in crimes another race I view,
For all was great that former ages knew.
In Aristides just see Athens’ pride;                                                           15
See the brave Theban, who at Leuctra dy’d.
With him th’ unweary’d partner of his wars,
Looks up elate and glories in his fears.
There moves the father of the Grecian state,
Whose name Thermopylae hath snatch’d from fate;                            20
And yet an endless train to these succeeds,
The chief who conquers and the sage who bleeds,
Rome’s awful names now crowd upon my mind,
Her first great Brutus, glory of mankind,
The voice of nature dying in his ear,                                                       25
The voice of Rome alone he knew to hear;
There leans Horatius on his darling boy,
And smiles superior with a Roman joy,
The Fabii, Decii, see, and o’er the rest,
Great Cato tow’rs, the wisest and the best,                                                   30
Cato, the last of Romans, and the pride,
Cato, who never err’d, but when he dy’d.
Behind the sons of glorious mischief press,
Whose deeds can plead no merit but success;
Young Ammon, Caesar, there with gesture proud,                                  35
Drink the mad plaudit of the ruin’d crowd.
But who are these of later times, I ween,
Of equal worth that crowd the shifting scene?
My soul presaging knows the kindred line,
Ye Henrys, Edwards, yes, I call ye mine.                                                      40
Each look, each smile, some pleasing thought conveys,
Of tyrants humbled on victorious days,
When Edward, Henry, and his son appears,
I start to Cressy, Agincourt, Poictiers,
And later yet, behold a virgin sway                                                             45
Fair Albion’s sceptre, and the world obey,
Yet, yet, one more, a mother, wife, and queen,
O’er vanquish’d nations looks with placid mien,
Imperial Anna; yes, thy name shall stand,
The grace, the pride, the glory of our land,                                                 50
Not Rome, nor Greece, nor antient times disdain,
To mix their honours with great Anna’s reign.
Thrice happy, Britain! if thy favour’d throne,
Still in a monarch had a parent known,
No wretch, who bold perverse and haughty still                                        55
Made his will law, and not our laws his will.
Yet let no murmurs rise, since heav’n presides,
Since all our fortunes boundless wisdom guides:
As guilt uncheck’d would call for burning rain,
Or bid some deluge drown the world again,                                                60
Tyrant’s must rise, the nation’s iron rod,
The scourge of vengeance in the hand of God.
Thus good and bad by turns appear to view,
The bad how many, and the good how few:
But tyrants soon in penal chains shall groan,                                               65
And injur’d kings possess a lasting throne.

NOTES:

 2 vot’ry Votary, “a devoted or zealous worshipper” (OED); vouchsafe “Confer or bestow” (OED).

 15 Aristides just Aristides the Just (fl. 5th century BC), an Athenian statesman, general, and founder of the Delian League” (Britannica).

16 the brave Theban, who at Leuctra dy’d Probably a reference to Epaminondas, a “Theban statesman” who defeated Sparta at the Battle of Leuctra “and made Thebes the most powerful state in Greece.” However, Epaminondas did not die at Leuctra, but at Mantineia years later (Britannica).

19 the father of the Grecian state Probably a reference to Leonidas I (d. 480 BC), a Spartan king who led a “stand against the Persian army at the pass of Thermopylae” (Britannica).

24 Brutus Lucius Junius Brutus (fl. 600-551 BC) was a “semilegendary figure” believed “to have founded the Roman Republic” (Britannica).

27 Horatius Horatius Cocles (6th century or legendary hero) who “defended the Sublician bridge (in Rome) against … the entire Etruscan army” (Britannica).

29 Fabii, Decii Ancient Roman patrician and plebeian families, famous for their patriotic courage and sacrifice (Britannica).

30 Great Cato Marcus Porcius Cato (95-46 BC), a Roman senator “who tried to preserve the Roman republic against power seekers, in particular Julius Caesar” (Britannica).

35 Ammon “Egyptian diety who was revered as king of the gods” (Britannica); Caesar Possible reference to Roman dictator Caius Julius Caesar, though the word can also refer to all Roman emperors “down to the fall of Constantinople” (OED).

36 plaudit “Applause,” or “any emphatic expression of approval” (OED).

37 ween “To think, surmise, suppose” (OED).

39 presaging “To foretell; to predict, forecast” (OED).

40 Henrys, Edwards Likely a general reference to the past kings of England. At the time of this poem’s publication, fourteen English monarchs had borne the name Henry or Edward (Historic UK).

43 Edward Edward III (1312-1377, reigned from 1327, began the Hundred Years’ War and oversaw English victories at Crecy and Poitiers; Henry, and his son appears Most likely references Henry IV (1367-1413), reigned from 1399, and Henry V (1386-1422), reigned from 1413, defeated the French at Agincourt and would have succeeded to the French throne had he not died prematurely of dysentery (Historic UK).

44 Cressy, Agincourt, Poictiers Battles between English and French forces during the Hundred Years’ War that resulted in English victories (Britannica).

45 behold a virgin sway Reference to Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603), reigned from 1558, known as the “Virgin Queen” (Britannica).

46 Albion’s “Originally: the island of Britain. Later: the nation of Britain or England, often with reference to past times, or to a romanticized concept of the nation” (OED).

49 Imperial Anna Queen Anne (1665-1714), reigned from 1702; she was “the last Stuart Monarch” (Britannica).

59 burning rain Biblical reference to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah from the Book of Genesis:  “Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven” (King James Bible, Genesis 19:24).

60 some deluge drown the world again Reference to “the biblical account of the Deluge” from the Book of Genesis, in which God destroys the world with a catastrophic flood (Britannica).

SOURCE:  The Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. 24 (March 1754), pp. 135-136. [Google Books]

Edited by Ethan Rappeport

Henry Norris, “Friendship”

HENRY NORRIS

“Friendship”

Addressed to Mr. J. C. WESTCOTT, of Exeter College, Oxon.

Solem enim e mundo tollere videntur, qui Amicitiam e
vita tollunt; qua a diis immortalibus nihil melius ha-
bemus, nihil jucundius.
                                                                      Cic[ero].

Whether reclin’d on Charwell’s flow’ry side,
Or where fair Isis rolls her watry pride;
Arise, my PYLADES; to thee I sing,
To thee and Friendship wake the slumb’ring string.

Cement of souls, celestial child of JOVE,                                         5
Pure emanation of immortal love,
Great Friendship, come; enlarge my op’ning mind,
Refine my soul with love of good and kind,
Nor leave one sordid grain of self behind.
So let me taste thy joys, uncumber’d, free,                                           10
And future heav’n anticipate in thee.
What, without thee, were life, were glory, fame?
A morning shadow, and an empty name.
The black’ning horrors of tempestuous fate,
‘Tis thine to brighten, thine to dissipate:                                                15
Whate’er of bliss we know, ’tis thine to give,
And without thee to live, were not to live.

When Heav’n first rais’d the great creative plan,
And into being spake the fav’rite, man;
Around he saw celestial blessings show’r,                                              20
Proud of his world, his essence, and his pow’r;
But, in his breast, still felt a painful void
Of something yet unknown, yet unenjoy’d.
JOVE view’d his work; the great design to mend,
He gave him bliss, and call’d that bliss a friend.                                      25
“Friendship, arise;” thus spake the eternal Sire;
“With glowing sentiment the breast inspire.
Go, soften sorrow, blunt the stings of care,
And teach mankind the ills of life to bear.
The task, how glorious! to dilate the soul,                                                30
And breathe soft sympathy throughout the whole;
To give the mind to taste of joys divine;
From baser dregs ideas to refine;
The task, how glorious! my son, be thine.”

All nature felt the gift; new joys to prove,                                         35
Kind mix’d with kind, and waken’d into love:
All seek their friend, in sweet communion join,
And mingle souls, with ecstasy divine.
’Tis Heav’n has fix’d, soft feelings to suggest,
This sympathetic load-stone in the breast.                                               40
Thus souls their kindred souls magnetic draw,
And all maintain this universal law:
That still, whatever nature steers the mind,
Like to her sister like will be inclin’d.
Virtue with pleasure views, impress’d on youth,                                    45
The lively semblance of her native truth:
While Vice, with grin of joy, exults to see
The growing marks of shame and infamy.
Hence, e’en the vicious catch the friendly flame;
(If Friendship knows with them that sacred name;)                               50
Indulge the blaze, ‘midst riotry and noise,
And feast with rapture, on adult’rate joys;
Tho’ vitiated sense the gust destroys.

Congenial souls with equal passions move,
The same their hatred, the same their love:                                            55
By force of sympathy, they cool, or burn,
And smile for smile, or sigh for sigh return:
Lords of each others heart, supreme they reign,
Taste all their bliss, or die beneath their pain.
See, in their breasts enthron’d, one common mind,                              60
Tho’ Heav’n distinct apartments has assign’d:
Tho’, fetter’d, each endures his sep’rate frame,
Yet is their soul, their ev’ry will the same.
Thus clog’d, their spirits fain would wing their flight,
Pant to get free, and, what they can, unite.                                             65
But though their bodies fate forbids to join,
Tho’ walls of flesh the fever’d soul confine;
Yet still their streams of life united run,
One, in their will, and in their friendship, one.
Should distant realms their mutual hopes divide,                                  70
From the Thames’ fair banks, to Ganges’ fertile tide;
Still would the soul, impatient to embrace,
Scornful o’er-shoot the narrow pale of space;
On wings ideal, from her prison start,
And fly to meet her correspondent part.                                                 75
So two fair lucid streams their courses bend,
In fond embrace their wedded waves to blend;
With fervid haste the silver surges roll,
To join in love, and form one friendly whole.

When works the soul, with joy’s glad burthen press’d,                   80
When pants, with strangling care, the heaving breast;
How sweet to give the struggling load relief,
To share our hoarded joys, our treasur’d grief;
Unlock the secret casket of the heart,
And ev’ry pleasure, ev’ry pain impart!                                                       85
How sweet to hang on Friendship’s tuneful tongue,
To drink, with thirsty ear, the love-fraught song!
Catch the young accents, as they swell to birth,
Heralds of grief, or harbingers of mirth!
To mingle tear with tear, meet smile with smile,                                    90
Enhance the bliss, or sorrow thus beguile!
These are thy joys, O Friendship, joys that spring
Beneath thy eye, and claim they parent wing.
Joys, great as these, may lavish fate decree,
To bless profuse my PYLADES and me.                                                    95
Nor wealth I beg, no ermin’d pomp implore;
Grant but my friend, and, Heav’n, I’ll ask no more.

NOTES:

Subtitle Mr. J. C. Westcott Unable to trace; Oxon. An abbreviation for Oxford University.

Epigraph Cicero Marcus Tullius Cicero (106 BCE-43 BCE), Roman statesman, lawyer, and writer, known for his oratory and rhetorical skills. “They might as well steal the sun from the heavens as remove friendship from life! For nothing we have from the gods is better or more enjoyable than friendship.” From Laelius de Amicitia, a treatise on friendship published in 44 BCE.

1 Charwell Northernmost tributary of the River Thames (Britannica).

2 Isis Alternative name for the River Thames (Britannica).

3 PYLADES Cousin and closest friend of Orestes, a hero of ancient Greek mythology (Britannica).

5 JOVE Jupiter, the king of the Roman gods.

71 Thames River in southern England that flows through London; Ganges River in India and Bangladesh.

96 ermin’d Clothed with fur of the ermine; a species of weasel whose pelt was used historically in royal robes in Europe (OED).

SOURCE:  Poems on Various Subjects (Taunton, 1774), pp. 18-24. [Google Books]

Edited by Aydin Jang

Phillis Wheatley, “On Recollection”

 PHILLIS WHEATLEY

“On Recollection”

 

MNEME begin. Inspire, ye sacred nine,
Your vent’rous Afric in her great design.
Mneme, immortal pow’r, I trace thy spring:
Assist my strains, while I thy glories sing:
The acts of long departed years, by thee                                    5
Recover’d, in due order rang’d we see:
Thy pow’r the long-forgotten calls from night,
That sweetly plays before the fancy’s sight.

Mneme in our nocturnal visions pours
The ample treasure of her secret stores;                                    10
Swift from above she wings her silent flight
Through Phoebe’s realms, fair regent of the night;
And, in her pomp of images display’d,
To the high-raptur’d poet gives her aid,
Through the unbounded regions of the mind,                           15
Diffusing light celestial and refin’d.
The heav’nly phantom paints the actions done
By ev’ry tribe beneath the rolling sun.

Mneme, enthron’d within the human breast,
Has vice condemn’d, and ev’ry virtue blest.                                 20
How sweet the sound when we her plaudit hear?
Sweeter than music to the ravish’d ear,
Sweeter than Maro’s entertaining strains
Resounding through his groves, and hills, and plains.
But how is Mneme dreaded by the race,                                       25
Who scorn her warnings, and despise her grace?
By her unveil’d each horrid crime appears,
Her awful hand a cup of wormwood bears.
Days, years, misspent, O what a hell of woe!
Hers the worst tortures that our souls can know.                      30

Now eighteen years their destin’d course have run,
In fast succession round the central sun.
How did the follies of that period pass
Unnotic’d, but behold them writ in brass!
In Recollection see them fresh return,                                           35
And sure ‘tis mine to be asham’d, and mourn.

O Virtue, smiling in immortal green,
Do thou exert thy pow’r, and change the scene;
Be thine employ to guide my future days,
And mine to pay the tribute of my praise.                                    40

Of Recollection such the pow’r enthron’d
In ev’ry breast, and thus her pow’r is own’d.
The wretch, who dar’d the vengeance of the skies,
At last awakes in horror and surprize,
By her alarm’d, he sees impending fate,                                        45
He howls in anguish, and repents too late.
But O! what peace, what joys are hers t’ impart
To ev’ry holy, ev’ry upright heart!
Thrice blest the man, who, in her sacred shrine,
Feels himself shelter’d from the wrath of divine!                         50

NOTES:

1 Mneme The muse of memory; sacred nine The nine muses of Greek mythology.

8 fancy Poetic imagination.

12 Phoebe In Greek mythology, “she was identified with the moon” (Britannica).

21 plaudit “An expression of praise or approval” (OED).

23 Maro Publius Vergilius Maro, or Virgil (70 BCE-19 BCE), “Roman poet best known for his national epic, The Aenied” (Britannica).

28 wormwood “An emblem or type of what is bitter and grievous to the soul” (OED).

SOURCE:  Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (London, 1773), pp. 62-64.
https://www.gilderlehrman.org/sites/default/files/GLC06154.pdf

Edited by Markesha Grant

Anonymous, “To Mr. C–T–BY”

ANONYMOUS

“To Mr. C – T – BY”

Ne sit ancilla tibi amor pudori, &c.
Horace, Book II. Ode IV. Imitated

 

Smit with a spider-brusher’s face,
Think not thy passion a disgrace,
Nor look to d—’d dejected;
Where is thy ancient valour fled?
Nay – never blush, and hang thy head,                           5
Like Bobadil detected.

When Cupid wills his darts to fly,
From corner of a cookmaid’s eye,
The stoutest may be taken;
And whilst she stirs the kitchen fire,                               10
Kindling her cheeks, and his desire,
His heart may melt like bacon.

Then blush not at th’ ignoble flame,
Heroes of old have done the same,
Tho’ great within the trenches;                                 15
Achilles, Ajax, and the Czar,
Soften’d the rugged brow of war
In private with their wenches.

Courage, dear boy, return once more,
Leave not Cindrilla to deplore,                                          20
Whom thy sweet air bewitches;
Her mop, her brush, neglected lie—
She can nor make or bake a pie—
Scarce see to wash her dishes.

Wilt thou no more frequent the green?                             25
With folded arms no more be seen,
Thy own sweet person viewing?
O how she longs to see thee there,
With wrinkled boot, and turn’d-up hair,
Tho’ to her own undoing!                                              30

And then to hear thee talk so fine,
Of horses, w—s, and where to dine,
In neat set phrase so charming—
Cindrilla swears her heart is won,
That she’s resolv’d to be undone,                                        35
And give her mistress warning.

The misses may be pert and sneer,
But servants, tho’ in common geer,
Stuff gowns, and coarser jacket,
May yet conceal as fair a skin,                                               40
Be as provocative to sin,
And make not half the racket.

Besides, who knows, thy love may be
Of noble blood, in low degree,
Tho’ now with scarce a rag on;                                45
Some fairy, envious of her worth,
Doom’d her to labour from her birth,
Sprung from renown’d Pendragon.

Come then to thy Cindrilla’s arms,
Bedizen’d in her Sunday charms,                                           50
No gaudy silks and sattins;
But new-starch’d cap, and tuck’d-up gown,
With red and white that’s all her own,
Stuff petticoat, and pattins.

Pardon, if in these lyric lays                                                     55
I trumpet forth Cindrilla’s praise,
Her beauty tho’ uncommon;
With fourscore years upon my head,
Thou hast but little cause to dread
A poor infirm old woman.                                                 60

NOTES:

Title Unable to identify addressee.  This poem is preceded by a letter to Mr. Urban recommending publication, dated “Bristol, Aug. 20” and signed “Z.”

Epigraph Ne sit ancilla tibi amor pudori “Do not let love for a maidservant be your shame;” Horace, Book II. Ode IV“To Xanthias Phoceus,” in which Horace consoles his friend for falling in love with his servant girl.

1 spider-brusher A servant.

3 dejected “Depressed in spirits, downcast, disheartened, low spirited” (OED).

4 valour “Bravery” (OED).

6 Bobadil A reference to a character in Ben Jonson’s play, Every Man in his Humour (1598); “a blustering braggart who pretends prowess” (OED).

16 Achilles “Briseis” [Author’s note]. A figure in Homer’s Illiad. She was captured by Achilles during the Trojan War and became his lover; Ajax “Tecmessa” [Author’s note]. Ajax killed Tecmessa’s father during the Trojan War and took her captive.  Their union produced a son, Eurysaces; Czar “Catherine, the wife of a Swedish serjeant” [Author’s note]. Czar Peter III (1728-1762) was emperor of Russia from January to July of 1762.  He was overthrown by his wife, who became Catherine the Great (1729-1796), reigned from 1762-1796 (Britannica).

20 Cindrilla Variant of Cinderella; the most popular version of the Cinderella story in the eighteenth century was the English translation of Charles Perrault’s Histoires ou contes du temps passe (1697).

37 pert “Impertinent, cheeky” (OED).

38 geer Clothing.

48 Pendragon Probably a reference to Uther Pendragon, legendary King of the Britons and supposed father of King Arthur; here a reference to the theme of illegitimate conception.

50 Bedizen’d “To dress out especially in vulgar or gaudy fashion” (OED).

SOURCE: The Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. 54, part II (September 1784), p. 694. [J. Paul Leonard Library]

Edited by Jhadeeja Shahida Vaz

John Hughes, “A Letter to a Friend in the Country”

JOHN HUGHES

“A Letter to a Friend in the Country”

Whilst thou art happy in a blest Retreat,
And free from Care dost rural Songs repeat,
Whilst fragrant Air fans thy Poetick Fire,
And pleasant Groves with sprightly Notes inspire,
(Groves, whose Recesses and refreshing Shade                                 5
Indulge th’ Invention, and the Judgment aid)
I, ‘midst the Smoke and Clamours of the Town,
That choke my Muse and weigh my Fancy down,
Pass my unactive Hours; ——
In such an Air, how can soft Numbers flow,                                         10
Or in such Soil the sacred Laurel grow?
All we can boast of the Poetick Fire,
Are but some Sparks that soon as born expire.
Hail happy Woods! Harbours of Peace and Joy!
Where no black Cares the Mind’s Repose destroy!                             15
Where grateful Silence unmolested reigns,
Assists the Muse and quickens all her Strains.
Such were the Scenes of our first Parents Love,
In Eden’s Groves with equal Flames they strove,
While warbling Birds, soft whisp’ring Breaths of Wind,                       20
And murmuring Streams, to grace their Nuptials join’d.
All Nature smil’d; the Plains were fresh and green,
Unstain’d the Fountains, and the Heav’ns serene.
Ye blest Remains of that illustrious Age!
Delightful Springs and Woods! ——                                                         25
Might I with You my peaceful Days live o’er,
You, and my Friend, whose Absence I deplore,
Calm as a gentle Brook’s unruffled Tide
Shou’d the delicious flowing Minutes glide;
Discharg’d of Care, on unfrequented Plains,                                           30
We’d sing of rural Joys in rural Strains.
No false corrupt Delights our Thoughts shou’d move,
But Joys of Friendship, Poetry and Love.
While others fondly feed Ambition’s Fire,
And to the Top of human State aspire,                                                     35
That from their Airy Eminence they may
With Pride and Scorn th’ inferior World survey,
Here we shou’d dwell obscure, yet happier far than they.

NOTES:

4 sprightly “Bright, clear, cheerful; lively, energetic” (OED).

8 Fancy That is, poetic imagination.

10 Numbers Poetry.

11 sacred Laurel Associated with Apollo, Greek god of poetry. Wreathes of laurel were crowned upon renowned poets, meant to symbolize divine inspiration.

15 black “Full of gloom, melancholy, misery, or sadness” (OED); Repose “State… of being free from care, anxiety, or other disturbances; ease, serenity” (OED).

18 first Parents Adam and Eve. In Christian theology, created as the first humans, meant to dwell in harmony with the idyllic Garden of Eden.

20 warbling “Of birds: To sing clearly and sweetly” (OED).

31 Strains “A musical sequence of sounds; a melody, tune” (OED).

35 State “A person’s social, professional, or legal status or condition” (OED).

SOURCE: Poems upon Several Occasions (London, 1735), pp. 111-113. [Google Books]

Edited by Joy Seydel

Elizabeth Carter, “Written at Midnight in a Thunderstorm. To——“

ELIZABETH CARTER

“Written at Midnight in a Thunderstorm. To ——–“

 

Let coward Guilt with pallid Fear,
To shelt’ring Caverns fly,
And justly dread the vengeful Fate,
That thunders thro’ the Sky.

Protected by that Hand, whose Law                                    5
The threat’ning Storms obey,
Intrepid Virtue smiles secure,
As in the Blaze of Day.

In the thick Clouds tremendous Gloom,
The Light’nings lurid Glare,                                            10
It views the same all-gracious Pow’r,
That breathes the vernal Air.

Thro’ Nature’s ever varying Scene,
By diff’rent Ways pursu’d,
The one eternal End of Heav’n                                               15
Is universal Good.

The same unchanging Mercy rules
When flaming AEther glows,
As when it tunes the Linnet’s Voice,
Or blushes in the Rose.                                                     20

By Reason taught to scorn those Fears
That vulgar Minds molest;
Let no fantastic Terrors break
My dear Narcissa‘s Rest.

Thy Life may all the tend’rest Care                                          25
Of Providence defend;
And delegated Angels round
Their guardian Wings extend.

When, thro’ Creation’s vast Expanse,
The last dread Thunders roll,                                             30
Untune the Concord of the Spheres,
And shake the rising Soul:

Unmov’d mayst thou the final Storm,
Of jarring Worlds survey,
That ushers in the glad Serene                                                  35
Of everlasting Day.

NOTES:

1 pallid “Lacking depth or intensity” (OED).

18 Aether In ancient cosmological speculation: an element conceived as filling all space beyond the sphere of the moon, and being the constituent substance of the stars and planets and of their spheres (OED).

19 Linnet “A common and well-known songbird” (OED).

SOURCE: Poems on Several Occasions. Second Edition (London, 1766), pp. 36-37. [Google Books]

 Edited by Wyatt Forsyth

George Granville, Lord Lansdowne, “The Vision”

GEORGE GRANVILLE, LORD LANSDOWNE

“The Vision”

 

In lonely Walks, distracted by Despair,
Shunning Mankind and torn with killing Care,
My Eyes o’erflowing, and my frantick Mind
Rack’d with wild Thoughts, swelling with Sighs the Wind;
Thro’ Paths untrodden, Day and Night I rove,                                              5
Mourning the Fate of my successless Love.
Who most desire to live, untimely fall,
But when we beg to die, Death flies our Call;
Adonis dies, and torn is the lov’d Breast
In midst of Joy, where Venus wont to rest;                                                    10
That Fate, which cruel seem’d to him, would be
Pity, Relief, and Happiness to me.
When will my Sorrows end? In vain, in vain
I call to Heaven, and tell the Gods my Pain;
The Gods averse, like Mira, to my Pray’r,                                                     15
Consent to doom, whom she denies to spare.
Why do I seek for foreign Aids, when I
Bear ready by my Side the Pow’r to die?
Be keen, my Sword, and serve thy Master well,
Heal Wounds with Wounds, and Love with Death repel.                           20
Straight up I rose, and to my aking Breast,
My bosom bare, the ready Point I prest,
When lo! astonish’d, an unusual Light
Pierc’d the thick Shade, and all around grew bright;
My dazled Eyes a radiant Form behold,                                                         25
Splendid with Light, like Beams of burning Gold;
Eternal Rays his shining Temples grace;
Eternal Youth sat blooming on his Face.
Trembling I listen, prostrate on the Ground,
His Breath perfumes the Grove, and Musick’s in the Sound.                     30
Cease, Lover, cease thy tender Heart to vex,
In fruitless Plaints of an ungrateful Sex.
In Fate’s eternal Volumes it is writ,
That Women ever shall be Foes to Wit.
With proper Arts their sickly Minds command,                                            35
And please ’em with the things they understand;
With noisy Fopperies their Hearts assail,
Renounce all Sense; how should thy Songs prevail,
When I, the God of Wit, so oft could fail?
Remember me, and in my Story find                                                              40
How vainly Merit pleads to Womankind:
I, by whom all things shine, who tune the Spheres,
Create the Day, and gild the Night with Stars;
Whose Youth and Beauty, from all Ages past,
Sprang with the World, and with the World shall last.                                 45
How oft with fruitless Tears have I implor’d
Ungrateful Nymphs, and tho’ a God, ador’d?
When could my Wit, my Beauty, or my Youth,
Move a hard Heart? or, mov’d, secure its Truth?
Here a proud Nymph, with painful Steps I chace,                                 50
The Winds out-flying in our nimble Race ;
Stay Daphne, stay————In vain, in vain I try
To stop her Speed, redoubling at my cry,
O’er craggy Rocks and rugged Hills she climbs,
And tears on pointed Flints her tender Limbs:                                             55
‘Till caught at length, just as my Arms I fold,
Turn’d to a Tree she yet escapes my Hold.
In my next Love, a diff’rent Fate I find,
Ah! which is worse, the False, or the Unkind?
Forgetting Daphne, I Coronis choose,                                                              60
A kinder Nymph—-too kind for my Repose:
The Joys I give, but more provoke her Breast,
She keeps a private Drudge to quench the rest;
How, and with whom, the very Birds proclaim
Her black Pollution, and reveals my Shame.                                                65
Hard Lot of Beauty! fatally bestow’d,
Or given to the False, or to the Proud;
By different ways they bring us equal Pain,
The False betray us, and the Proud disdain.
Scorn’d and abus’d, from mortal Loves I fly,                                                70
To seek more Truth in my own native Sky.
Venus, the fairest of immortal Loves,
Bright as my Beams, and gentle as her Doves.
With glowing Eyes, confessing warm Desires,
She summons Heaven and Earth to quench her Fires,                              75
Me she excludes, and I in vain adore,
Who neither God nor Man refus’d before;
Vulcan, the very Monster of Skies,
Vulcan she takes, the God of Wit denies.
Then cease to murmur at thy Mira’s Pride,                                           80
Whimsy, not Reason is the female Guide;
The Fate, of which their Master does complain,
Is of bad Omen to th’ inspired Train.
What Voes have fail’d? Hark how Catullus mourns,
How Ovid weeps, and slighted Gallus burns;                                               85
In melting Strains see gentle Waller bleed,
Unmov’d she heard, what none unmov’d can read.
And thou, who oft with such ambitious Choice,
Hast rais’d to Mira thy aspiring Voice,
What Profit thy neglected Zeal repays?                                                       90
Ah what Return? Ungrateful to thy Praise!
Change, change thy Style, with mortal Rage return
Unjust Disdain, and Pride oppose to Scorn;
Search all the Secrets of the Fair and Young,
And then proclaim, soon shall they bribe thy Tongue;                              95
The sharp Detractor with Success assails,
Sure to be gentle to the Man that rails;
Women, like Cowards, tame to the Severe,
Are only fierce when they discover Fear.
Thus spake the God; and upward mounts in Air,                               100
In just Resentment of his past Despair.
Provok’d to Vengeance, to my Aid I call
The Furies round, and dip my Pen in Gall:
Not one shall ‘scape of all the cozening Sex,
Vext shall they be, who so delight to vex.                                                   105
In vain I try, in vain to Vengeance move
My gentle Muse, so us’d to tender Love;
Such Magick rules my Heart, whate’er I write
Turns all to soft Complaint, and am’rous Flight.
Be gone, fond Thoughts, be gone, be bold, said I,                                    110
Satyr’s thy Theme————In vain again I try,
So charming Mira to each sense appears,
My Soul adores, my Rage dissolves in Tears.
So the gall’d Lion, smarting with his Wound
Threatens his Foes, and makes the Forest sound,                                   115
With his strong Teeth he bites the bloody Dart,
And tares his Side with more provoking Smart,
Till having spent his Voice in fruitless Cries,
He lays him down, breaks his proud Heart, and dies.

NOTES:

9 Adonis The ideal of male beauty in Greek mythology; mortal lover of Aphrodite (Venus in the Roman tradition) who died in Aphrodite’s arms after being gored by a wild boar during a hunt (Britannica).

10 Venus  “The ancient Roman goddess of beauty and love (esp. sensual love), or the corresponding Greek goddess Aphrodite” (OED).

29 prostrate “To fall forward with the face downward… to throw oneself to the ground in reverence or submission” (OED).

30 His Breath…Sound “Apollo” [Author’s note].

32 Plaints  “The action or an act of plaining… audible expression of sorrow; (also) such an expression in verse or song, a lament” (OED).

37 Fopperies “Foolishness, imbecility, stupidity” (OED).

60 Coronis “A Nymph belov’d by Apollo, but at the same time had a private Inrigue with one Ischis, which was discover’d by a Crow” [Author’s note]. As a result, Apollo commanded his sister Artemis to kill her.

78 Vulcan Roman god of fire.

84 Catullus (c. 84 BCE-c. 54 BCE), “Roman poet whose expressions of love and hatred are generally considered the finest lyric poetry of ancient Rome” (Britannica).

85 Ovid (43 BCE-17 CE), Roman poet noted especially for his Ars amatoria (The Art of Love) and Metamorphoses; Gallus Gaius Cornelius Gallus (c. 70 BCE-26 BCE), “Roman soldier and poet, famous for four books of poems addressed to his mistress ‘Lycoris’” (Britannica).

86 Waller Edmund Waller (1606-1687), English poet and politician.  He unsuccessfully tried to court Lady Dorothy Sidney, addressing her as “Sacharissa” in his poetry (Britannica).

103 The Furies Goddesses of vengeance in Greco-Roman mythology (Britannica).

104 cozening “Cheating, deceitful, fraudulent” (OED).

SOURCE: Poems Upon Several Occasions, with the British Enchanters, a Dramatic Poem (Dublin, 1732), pp. 57- 61.  [Google Books]

Edited by Elisha Taylor