Such duty in a flower display'd
The holy sisters smiled to see,
Forgave the pagan rites it paid,
And lov'd its fond idolatry.
But painful still, though meant for kind,
The praise that falls on envy's ear!
O'er the dim window's arch entwin'd,
The canker'd Ivy chanc'd to hear.
And see (she cried) that specious flower,
Whose flattering bosom courts the sun,
The pageant of a gilded hour,
The convent's simple hearts hath won!
'Obsequious meanness! ever prone To watch the patron's turning eye; No will, no motion of its own!
'Tis this they love, for this they sigh. 6 Go, splendid sycophant! no more Display thy soft seductive arts! The flattering clime of courts explore, Nor spoil the convent's simple hearts. 'To me their praise more justly due,
Of longer bloom, and happier grace!
Whom changing months unalter'd view,
And find them in my fond embrace.'—
How well (the modest flower replied)
Can Envy's wrested eye elude
The obvious bounds that still divide
Foul Flattery from fair Gratitude.
"My duteous praise each hour I pay,
For few the hours that I must live;
And give to him my little day,
Whose grace another day may give.
When low this golden form shall fall,
And spread with dust its parent plain ;
That dust shall hear his genial call,
And rise, to glory rise, again.
To thee, my gracious power, to thee
My love, my heart, my life are due!
Thy goodness gave that life to be;
Thy goodness shall that life renew.
'Ah me! one moment from thy sight
That thus my truant-eye should stray!
The god of glory sets in night:
His faithless flower has lost a day.'
Sore griev'd the flower and droop'd her head; And sudden tears her breast bedew'd: Consenting tears the sisters shed,
And wrapt in holy wonder, view'd.
With joy, with pious pride elate,
'Behold (the aged abbess cries)
An emblem of that happier fate
Which Heaven to all but us denies.
'Our hearts no fears but duteous fears,
No charm but duty's charm can move;
We shed no tears but holy tears
Of tender penitence and love.
'See there the envious world portray'd
In that dark look, that creeping pace!
No flower can bear the Ivy's shade;
No tree support its cold embrace.
'The oak that rears it from the ground,
And bears its tendrils to the skies,
Feels at his heart the rankling wound,
And in its poisonous arms he dies.'
Her moral thus the matron read,
Studious to teach her children dear,
And they by love, or duty led,
With pleasure heard, or seem'd to hear.
Yet one less duteous, not less fair,
(In convents still the tale is known)
The fable heard with silent care,
But found a moral of her own.
The flower that smil'd along the day,
And droop'd in tears at evening's fall;
Too well she found her life display,
Too well her fatal lot recall.
The treacherous Ivy's gloomy shade,
That murder'd what it most embrac❜d,
Too well that cruel scene convey'd
Which all her fairer hopes effac❜d.
Her heart with silent horror shook;
With sighs she sought her lonely cell:
To the dim light she cast one look;
And bade once more the world farewell!
THERE are that love the shades of life,
And shun the splendid walks of fame;
There are that hold it rueful strife
To risk Ambition's losing game;
That far from Envy's lurid eye
The fairest fruits of Genius rear,
Content to see them bloom and die
In Friendship's small but kindly sphere.
Than vainer flowers though sweeter far,
The Evening-Primrose shuns the day;
Blooms only to the western star,
And loves its solitary ray.
In Eden's vale, an aged hind,
At the dim twilight's closing hour, On his time-smoothed staff reclin'd, With wonder view'd the opening flower. 'Ill-fated flower, at eve to blow; (In pity's simple thought he cries) Thy bosom must not feel the glow Of splendid suns or smiling skies. 'Nor thee, the vagrants of the field, The hamlet's little train behold; Their eyes to sweet oppression yield, When thine the falling shades unfold. 'Nor thee the hasty shepherd heeds, When love has fill'd his heart with cares; For flowers he rifles all the meads,
For waking flowers-but thine forbears. 'Ah! waste no more that beauteous bloom On night's chill shade, that fragrant breath; Let smiling suns those gems illume!
Fair flower, to live unseen is death.'
Soft as the voice of vernal gales
That o'er the bending meadow blow,
Or streams that steal through even vales,
And murmur that they move so slow:
Deep in her unfrequented bower,
Sweet Philomela pour'd her strain ;
The bird of eve approv'd her flower,
And answer'd thus the anxious swain.
VOL. XXX.
L
By moonlight shades, in valleys green,
Lovely flower, we'll live unseen.
Of our pleasures deem not lightly,
Laughing Day may look more sprightly,
But I love the modest mein,
Still I love the modest mien
Of gentle Evening, and her star-train❜d queen.
'Didst thou, shepherd, never find,
Pleasure is of pensive kind?
Has thy cottage never known
That she loves to live alone?
Dost thou not at evening hour
Feel some soft and secret power,
Gliding o'er thy yielding mind,
Leave sweet serenity behind;
While all disarm'd, the cares of day
Steal through the falling gloom away?
Love to think thy lot was laid
In this undistinguish'd shade.
Far from the world's infectious view,
Thy little virtues safely blew.
Go, and in day's more dangerous hour,
Guard thy emblematic flower.'
THE LAUREL AND THE REED.
THE reed* that once the shepherd blew
On old Cephisus' hallow'd side,
To Sylla's cruel bow applied,
Its inoffensive master slew.
• The reeds on the banks of the Cephisus, of which the shepherds made their pipes, Sylla's soldiers used for arrows.
|