192

POETRY ALL-PERVADING.

In studied phrase, and ornate epithet,

And rounded period, poor and vapid thoughts,
Which peep from out the cumbrous ornaments
That overload their littleness. Its words

Are few, but deep and solemn; and they break
Fresh from the fount of feeling, and are full

Of all that passion which, on Carinel, fired

The holy prophet, when his lips were coal,
His language winged with terror, as when bolts
Leap from the brooding tempest, armed with wrath.
Commissioned to affright us and destroy.

PERCIVAL.

THE POETS OF GREECE.

HERE shalt thou hear and learn

Of harmony, in tones and numbers hit
By voice or hand; and various-measured verse,
Eolian charms, and Dorian lyric odes,

And his who gave them breath, but higher sung,

Blind Melesigenes, thence Homer called,

Whose poem Phoebus challenged for his own:
Thence what the lofty, grave tragedians taught
In chorus or Iambic, teachers best
Of moral prudence, with delight received
In brief, sententious precepts, while they treat
Of fate and chance, and change in human life.

MILTON.

POW com'st thou on that gentle hand, where love should kisses

bring

For beauty's tribute? answer me, thou foul and frightful thing!
Why dwell upon thy hideous form those reverent eyes that

seem

Themselves the worshipped stars that light some youthful poet's dream?

194

UNIVERSAL BENEVOLENCE.

"When bends the thick and golden grain, that ripes at my command,

From the cracked earth I creep to bless with food the fainting land ;
And thus no foulness in my form the grateful people see,
But maids as sweet and bright as this are priestesses to me.

Throned in the slime of ancient Nile, I bid the earth to bear,
And blades and blossoms at my voice, and corn and fruits appear;
And thus upon my loathly form are showers of beauty shed,
And peace and plenty join to fling a halo round my head."

Dark teacher! tell me yet again, what hidden lore doth lie
Beneath the exoteric type of thy philosophy?

"The Useful is the Beautiful; the good and kind and true
To feature and to form impart their own celestial hue.

Learn further, that one common chain runs through the heavenly plan,
And links in bonds of brotherhood the beetle and the man :
Both foul and fair alike from Him, the Lord of Love, do spring;-
And this believe, he loves not well who loves not everything.”

LEITCH RITCHIE.

UNIVERSAL BENEVOLENCE.

APPY is he who lives to understand,
Not human nature, but explores

All natures, to the end that he may find

The law that governs each; and where begins

The union, the partition where, that makes

Kind and degree, among all visible beings;

The constitutions, powers, and faculties,