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!
See, at her call, 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!
COMPOSED WHILE THE AUTHOR WAS ENGAGED IN WRITING A
TRACT, OCCASIONED BY THE CONVENTION OF CINTRA, 1808.
Nor 'mid the World's vain objects! that enslave
The free-born Soul, - that World whose vaunted skill
In selfish interest perverts the will,
Whose factions lead astray the wise and brave;
Not there! but in dark wood and rocky cave,
And hollow vale which foaming torrents fill
With omnipresent murmur as they rave
Down their steep beds, that never shall be still:
Here, mighty Nature! in this school sublime
I weigh the hopes and fears of suffering Spain:
For her consult the auguries of time,
And through the human heart explore my way,
And look and listen gathering, whence I may,
Triumph, and thoughts no bondage can restrain.
COMPOSED AT THE SAME TIME AND ON THE SAME OCCASION.
I DROPPED my pen; and listened to the wind
That sang of trees up-torn and vessels tost;
A midnight harmony, and wholly lost
To the general sense of men by chains confined
Of business, care, or pleasure,
To timely sleep. Thought I, the impassioned strain,
Which, without aid of numbers, I sustain,
Like acceptation from the World will find.
Yet some with apprehensive ear shall drink
A dirge devoutly breathed o'er sorrows past,
And to the attendant promise will give heed
The prophecy, like that of this wild blast,
Which, while it makes the heart with sadness shrink, Tells also of bright calms that shall succeed.
Of mortal Parents is the Hero born
By whom the undaunted Tyrolese are led?
Or is it Tell's great Spirit, from the dead
Returned to animate an age forlorn?
He comes like Phoebus through the gates of morn
When dreary darkness is discomfited:
Yet mark his modest state! upon his head,
That simple crest, a heron's plume, is worn.
O Liberty! they stagger at the shock;
The Murderers are aghast; they strive to flee,
And half their Host is buried: rock on rock
Descends: - beneath this godlike Warrior, see !
Hills, Torrents, Woods, embodied to bemock
The Tyrant, and confound his cruelty.
come forth from thy Tyrolean ground,
Dear Liberty! stern Nymph of soul untamed,
Sweet Nymph, O rightly of the mountains named!
Through the long chain of Alps from mound to mound
And o'er the eternal snows, like Echo, bound,
Like Echo, when the Hunter-train at dawn
Have roused her from her sleep and forest-lawn,
Cliffs, woods, and caves, her viewless steps resound
And babble of her pastime! — On, dread Power!
With such invisible motion speed thy flight,
Through hanging clouds, from craggy height to height,
Through the green vales and through the Herdsman's bower,
That all the Alps may gladden in thy might,
Here, there, and in all places at one hour.
FEELINGS OF THE TYROLESE.
THE Land we from our Fathers had in trust,
And to our Children will transmit, or die:
This is our maxim, this our piety;
And God and Nature say that it is just.
That which we would perform in arms—
We read the dictate in the Infant's eye;
In the Wife's smile; and in the placid sky;
And, at our feet, amid the silent dust
Of them that were before us. Sing aloud
Old Songs, the precious music of the heart!
Give, Herds and Flocks, your voices to the wind!
While we go forth, a self-devoted crowd,
With weapons in the fearless hand, to assert
Our virtue, and to vindicate mankind.
ALAS! what boots the long laborious quest
Of moral prudence, sought through good and ill;
Or pains abstruse-to elevate the will,
And lead us on to that transcendent rest
Where every passion shall the sway attest
Of reason, seated on her sovereign hill;
What is it but a vain and curious skill,
If sapient Germany must lie deprest,
Beneath the brutal sword? Her haughty Schools
Shall blush; and may not we with sorrow say,
A few strong instincts and a few plain rules,
Among the herdsmen of the Alps, have wrought
More for mankind at this unhappy day
Than all the pride of intellect and thought?
AND is it among rude untutored Dales,
There, and there only, that the heart is true?
And, rising to repel or to subdue,
Is it by rocks and woods that man prevails?
Ah, no! though Nature's dread protection fails,
There is a bulwark in the soul.
Iberian Burghers when the sword they drew
In Zaragoza, naked to the gales
Of fiercely-breathing war. The truth was felt
By Palafox, and many a brave Compeer,
Like him of noble birth and noble mind;
By Ladies, meek-eyed Women without fear;
And Wanderers of the street, to whom is dealt
The bread which without industry they find.
O'ER the wide earth, on mountain and on plain,
Dwells in the affections and the soul of man
A Godhead, like the universal PAN,
But more exalted, with a brighter train :
And shall his bounty be dispensed in vain,
Showered equally on city and on field,
And neither hope nor steadfast promise yield
In these usurping times of fear and pain?
Such doom awaits us.
Nay, forbid it Heaven!
We know the arduous strife, the eternal laws
To which the triumph of all good is given,
High sacrifice, and labour without pause,
Even to the death: - else wherefore should the eye Of man converse with immortality?
ON THE FINAL SUBMISSION OF THE TYROLESE.
It was a moral end for which they fought;
Else how, when mighty Thrones were put to shame,
Could they, poor Shepherds, have preserved an aim,
A resolution, or enlivening thought?
Nor hath that moral good been vainly sought;
For in their magnanimity and fame
Powers have they left, an impulse, and a claim
Which neither can be overturned nor bought.
Sleep, Warriors, sleep! among your hills repose!
We know that ye, beneath the stern control
Of awful prudence, keep the unvanquished soul.
And, when impatient of her guilt and woes
Europe breaks forth, then, Shepherds! shall ye rise
For perfect triumph o'er your Enemies.
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