by Homer
To avenge than to prevent the breach of law:
That she is rigid in denouncing death
On petty robbers, and indulges life
And liberty, and ofttimes honour too,
To peculators of the public gold:
That thieves at home must hang; but he, that puts
Into his overgorged and bloated purse
The wealth of Indian provinces, escapes.
Nor is it well, nor can it come to good,
That through profane and infidel contempt
Of holy writ, she has presumed to annul
And abrogate, as roundly as she may,
The total ordinance and will of God;
Advancing fashion to the post of truth,
And centring all authority in modes
And customs of her own, till Sabbath rites
Have dwindled into unrespected forms,
And knees and hassocks are wellnigh divorced.
God made the country, and man made the town.
What wonder, then, that health and virtue, gifts
That can alone make sweet the bitter draught
That life holds out to all, should most abound
And least be threatened in the fields and groves?
Possess ye therefore, ye who, borne about
In chariots and sedans, know no fatigue
But that of idleness, and taste no scenes
But such as art contrives, possess ye still
Your element; there only ye can shine,
There only minds like yours can do no harm.
Our groves were planted to console at noon
The pensive wanderer in their shades. At eve
The moonbeam, sliding softly in between
The sleeping leaves, is all the light they wish,
Birds warbling all the music. We can spare
The splendour of your lamps, they but eclipse
Our softer satellite. Your songs confound
Our more harmonious notes. The thrush departs
Scared, and the offended nightingale is mute.
There is a public mischief in your mirth;
It plagues your country. Folly such as yours,
Graced with a sword, and worthier of a fan,
Has made, which enemies could ne’er have done,
Our arch of empire, steadfast but for you,
A mutilated structure, soon to fall.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Loss of the Royal George
William Cowper (1731–1800)
TOLL for the Brave!
The brave that are no more!
All sunk beneath the wave
Fast by their native shore!
Eight hundred of the brave 5
Whose courage well was tried,
Had made the vessel heel
And laid her on her side.
A land-breeze shook the shrouds
And she was overset; 10
Down went the Royal George,
With all her crew complete.
Toll for the brave!
Brave Kempenfelt is gone;
His last sea-fight is fought, 15
His work of glory done.
It was not in the battle;
No tempest gave the shock;
She sprang no fatal leak,
She ran upon no rock. 20
His sword was in its sheath,
His fingers held the pen,
When Kempenfelt went down
With twice four hundred men.
Weigh the vessel up 25
Once dreaded by our foes!
And mingle with our cup
The tears that England owes.
Her timbers yet are sound,
And she may float again 30
Full charged with England’s thunder,
And plough the distant main:
But Kempenfelt is gone,
His victories are o’er;
And he and his eight hundred 35
Shall plough the wave no more.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
To a Young Lady
William Cowper (1731–1800)
SWEET stream, that winds through yonder glade,
Apt emblem of a virtuous maid —
Silent and chaste she steals along,
Far from the world’s gay busy throng:
With gentle yet prevailing force, 5
Intent upon her destined course;
Graceful and useful all she does;
Blessing and blest where’er she goes;
Pure-bosom’d as that watery glass,
And Heaven reflected in her face. 10
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The Poplar Field
William Cowper (1731–1800)
THE POPLARS are fell’d, farewell to the shade
And the whispering sound of the cool colonnade;
The winds play no longer and sing in the leaves,
Nor Ouse on his bosom their image receives.
Twelve years have elapsed since I first took a view 5
Of my favourite field, and the bank where they grew:
And now in the grass behold they are laid,
And the tree is my seat that once lent me a shade.
The blackbird has fled to another retreat
Where the hazels afford him a screen from the heat; 10
And the scene where his melody charm’d me before
Resounds with his sweet-flowing ditty no more.
My fugitive years are all hasting away,
And I must ere long lie as lowly as they,
With a turf on my breast and a stone at my head, 15
Ere another such grove shall arise in its stead.
’Tis a sight to engage me, if anything can,
To muse on the perishing pleasures of man;
Short-lived as we are, our enjoyments, I see,
Have a still shorter date; and die sooner than we. 20
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk
William Cowper (1731–1800)
I AM monarch of all I survey;
My right there is none to dispute;
From the centre all round to the sea
I am lord of the fowl and the brute.
O Solitude! where are the charms 5
That sages have seen in thy face?
Better dwell in the midst of alarms,
Than reign in this horrible place.
I am out of humanity’s reach,
I must finish my journey alone, 10
Never hear the sweet music of speech;
I start at the sound of my own.
The beasts that roam over the plain
My form with indifference see;
They are so unacquainted with man, 15
Their tameness is shocking to me.
Society, Friendship, and Love
Divinely bestow’d upon man,
O, had I the wings of a dove
How soon would I taste you again! 20
My sorrows I then might assuage
In the ways of religion and truth;
Might learn from the wisdom of age,
And be cheer’d by the sallies of youth.
Ye winds that have made me your sport, 25
Convey to this desolate shore
Some cordial endearing report
Of a land I shall visit no more:
My friends, do they now and then send
A wish or a thought after me? 30
O tell me I yet have a friend,
Though a friend I am never to see.
How fleet is a glance of the mind!
Compared with the speed of its flight,
The tempest itself lags behind, 35
And the swift-wingèd arrows of light.
When I think of my own native land
In a moment I seem to be there;
But alas! recollection at hand
Soon hurries me back to despair. 40
But the sea-fowl is gone to her nest,
The beast is laid down in his lair;
Even here is a season of rest,
And I to my cabin repair.
There’s mercy in every place, 45
And mercy, encouraging thought!
Gives even affliction a grace
And reconciles man to his lot.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
To Mary Unwin
William Cowper (1731–1800)
MARY! I want a lyre with other strings,
Such aid from heaven as some have feign’d they drew,
An eloquence scarce given to mortals, new
And undebased by praise of meaner things,
That ere through age or woe I shed my wings 5
I may record thy worth with honour due,
In verse as musical as thou art true,
And that immortalizes whom it sings: —
But thou hast little need. There is a Book
By seraphs writ with beams of heavenly light, 10
On which the eyes of God not rarely look,
A chronicle of actions just and bright —
There all thy deeds, my faithful Mary, shine;
And since thou own’st that praise, I spare thee mine.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
To the Same
William Cowper (1731–1800)
THE TWENTIETH year is well-nigh past
Since first our sky was overcast;
Ah would that this might be the last!
My Mary!
Thy spirits have a fainter flow, 5
I see thee daily weaker grow —
’Twas my distress that brought thee low,
My Mary!
Thy needles, once a shining store,
For my sake restless heretofore, 10
Now rust disused, and shine no more;
My Mary!
For though thou gladly wouldst fulfil
The same kind office for me still,
Thy sight now seconds not thy will, 15
My Mary!
But well thou play’dst the housewife’s part,
And all thy threads with magic art
Have wound themselves about this heart,
My Mary! 20
Thy indistinct expressions seem
Like language utter’d in a dream;
Yet me they charm, whate’er the theme,
My Mary!
Thy silver locks, once auburn bright, 25
Are still more lovely in my sight
Than golden beams of orient light,
My Mary!
For could I view nor them nor thee,
What sight worth seeing could I see? 30
The sun would rise in vain for me,
My Mary!
Partakers of thy sad decline,
Thy hands their little force resign;
Yet, gently press’d, press gently mine, 35
My Mary!
Such feebleness of limbs thou prov’st
That now at every step thou mov’st
Upheld by two; yet still thou lov’st,
My Mary! 40
And still to love, though press’d with ill,
In wintry age to feel no chill,
With me is to be lovely still,
My Mary!
But ah! by constant heed I know 45
How oft the sadness that I show
Transforms thy smiles to looks of woe,
My Mary!
And should my future lot be cast
With much resemblance of the past, 50
Thy worn-out heart will break at last —
My Mary!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Boadicea: An Ode
William Cowper (1731–1800)
WHEN the British warrior queen,
Bleeding from the Roman rods,
Sought, with an indignant mien,
Counsel of her country’s gods,
Sage beneath a spreading oak 5
Sat the Druid, hoary chief;
Every burning word he spoke
Full of rage, and full of grief.
‘Princess! if our aged eyes
Weep upon thy matchless wrongs, 10
’Tis because resentment ties
All the terrors of our tongues.
‘Rome shall perish — write that word
In the blood that she has spilt;
Perish, hopeless and abhorred, 15
Deep in ruin as in guilt.
‘Rome, for empire far renowned,
Tramples on a thousand states;
Soon her pride shall kiss the ground —
Hark! the Gaul is at her gates! 20
‘Other Romans shall arise,
Heedless of a soldier’s name;
Sounds, not arms, shall win the prize —
Harmony the path to fame.
‘Then the progeny that springs 25
From the forests of our land,
Armed with thunder, clad with wings,
Shall a wider world command.
‘Regions Cæsar never knew
Thy posterity shall sway, 30
Where his eagles never flew,
None invincible as they.’
Such the bard’s prophetic words,
Pregnant with celestial fire,
Bending, as he swept the chords 35
Of his sweet but awful lyre.
She, with all a monarch’s pride,
Felt them in her bosom glow;
Rushed to battle, fought, and died;
Dying, hurled them at the foe. 40
‘Ruffians, pitiless as proud,
Heaven awards the vengeance due:
Empire is on us bestowed,
Shame and ruin wait for you.’
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The Castaway
William Cowper (1731–1800)
OBSCUREST night involved the sky,
The Atlantic billows roared,
When such a destined wretch as I,
Washed headlong from on board,
Of friends, of hope, of all bereft, 5
His floating home for ever left.
No braver chief could Albion boast
Than he with whom he went,
Nor ever ship left Albion’s coast
With warmer wishes sent. 10
He loved them both, but both in vain,
Nor him beheld, nor her again.
Not long beneath the whelming brine,
Expert to swim, he lay;
Nor soon he felt his strength decline, 15
Or courage die away;
But waged with death a lasting strife,
Supported by despair of life.
He shouted: nor his friends had failed
To check the vessel’s course, 20
But so the furious blast prevailed
That, pitiless perforce,
They left their outcast mate behind,
And scudded still before the wind.
Some succour yet they could afford; 25
And such as storms allow,
The cask, the coop, the floated cord,
Delayed not to bestow.
But he (they knew) nor ship nor shore,
Whate’er they gave, should visit more. 30
Nor, cruel as it seemed, could he
Their haste himself condemn,
Aware that flight, in such a sea,
Alone could rescue them;
Yet bitter felt it still to die 35
Deserted, and his friends so nigh.
He long survives, wh
o lives an hour
In ocean, self-upheld;
And so long he, with unspent power,
His destiny repelled; 40
And ever, as the minutes flew,
Entreated help, or cried ‘Adieu!’
At length, his transient respite past,
His comrades, who before
Had heard his voice in every blast, 45
Could catch the sound no more:
For then, by toil subdued, he drank
The stifling wave, and then he sank.
No poet wept him; but the page
Of narrative sincere, 50
That tells his name, his worth, his age
Is wet with Anson’s tear:
And tears by bards or heroes shed
Alike immortalize the dead.
I therefore purpose not, or dream, 55
Descanting on his fate,
To give the melancholy theme
A more enduring date:
But misery still delights to trace
Its semblance in another’s case. 60
No voice divine the storm allayed,
No light propitious shone,
When, snatched from all effectual aid,
We perished, each alone:
But I beneath a rougher sea, 65
And whelmed in deeper gulfs than he.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The Shrubbery
William Cowper (1731–1800)
O HAPPY shades! to me unblest!
