Now hangs in doubtful ruins o'er its base.
And flinty pyramids, and walls of brass,
Descend: the Babylonian spires are sunk;
Achaia, Rome, and Egypt moulder down.
Time shakes the stable tyranny of thrones,
And tottering empires rush by their own weight.
This huge rotundity we tread grows old;
And all those worlds that roll around the sun,
The sun himself, shall die; and ancient Night
Again involve the desolate abyss:
Till the great Father through the lifeless gloom
Extend his arm to light another world,
And bid new planets roll by other laws.
For through the regions of unbounded space,
Where unconfined Omnipotence has room,
Being, in various systems, fluctuates still
Between creation and abhorr'd decay:
It ever did; perhaps, and ever will.
New worlds are still emerging from the deep;
The old descending, in their turns to rise.
THROUGH various toils the' adventurous Muse has pass'd;
But half the toil, and more than half remains.
Rude is her theme, and hardly fit for song;
Plain, and of little ornament; and I
But little practised in the' Aonian arts.
Yet not in vain such labours have we tried,
If aught these lays the fickle health confirm.
To you, ye delicate, I write; for you
I tame my youth to philosophic cares,
And grow still paler by the midnight lamps.
Not to debilitate with timorous rules
A hardy frame; nor needlessly to brave
Unglorious dangers, proud of mortal strength;
Is all the lesson that in wholesome years
Concerns the strong. His care were ill bestow'd
Who would with warm effeminacy nurse
The thriving oak, which on the mountain's brow
Bears all the blasts that sweep the wintry heaven.
Behold the labourer of the glebe, who toils
In dust, in rain, in cold and sultry skies;
Save but the grain from mildews and the flood,
Nought anxious he what sickly stars ascend.
He knows no laws by Esculapius given;
He studies none. Yet him nor midnight fogs
Infest, nor those envenom'd shafts that fly
When rabid Sirius fires the' autumnal noon.
His habit pure with plain and temperate meals,
Robust with labour, and by custom steel'd
To every casualty of varied life;
Serene he bears the peevish eastern blast,
And uninfected breathes the mortal south.
Such the reward of rude and sober life;
Of labour such. By health the peasant's toil
Is well repaid; if exercise were pain
Indeed, and temperance pain. By arts like these
Laconia nursed of old her hardy sons;
And Rome's unconquer'd legions urged their way,
Unhurt, through every toil in every clime.
Toil, and be strong. By toil the flaccid nerves
Grow firm, and gain a more compacted tone;
The greener juices are by toil subdued.
Mellow'd, and subtilized; the vapid old
Expell'd, and all the rancour of the blood.
Come, my companions, ye who feel the charms
Of nature and the year; come, let us stray
Where chance or fancy leads our roving walk:
Come, while the soft voluptuous breezes fan
The fleecy heavens, inwrap the limbs in balm,
And shed a charming languor o'er the soul.
Nor when bright Winter sows with prickly frost
The vigorous ether, in unmanly warmth
Indulge at home; nor e'en when Eurus' blasts
This way and that convolve the labouring woods.
My liberal walks, save when the skies in rain
Or fogs relent, no season should confine
Or to the cloister'd gallery or arcade.
Go, climb the mountain; from the' etherial source
Imbibe the recent gale. The cheerful morn
Beams o'er the hills; go, mount the' exulting steed.
Already see the deep-mouth'd beagles catch
The tainted mazes; and, on eager sport
Intent, with emulous impatience try
Each doubtful trace.
Delight you more, go
chase the desperate deer;
And through its deepest solitudes awake
The vocal forest with the jovial horn.
But if the breathless chase o'er hill and dale Exceed your strength; a sport of less fatigue, Not less delightful, the prolific stream Affords. The crystal rivulet, that o'er A stony channel rolls its rapid maze, [bounds Swarms with the silver fry. Such, through the Of pastoral Stafford, runs the brawling Trent; Such Eden, sprung from Cumbrian mountains;
The Esk, o'erhung with woods; and such the stream On whose Arcadian banks I first drew air, Liddal; till now, except in Doric lays
Tuned to her murmurs by her lovesick swains,
Unknown in song: though not a purer stream,
Through meads more flowery or more romantic
groves,
Rolls toward the western main. Hail,sacred flood!
May still thy hospitable swains be bless'd
In rural innocence; thy mountains still
Teem with the fleecy race; thy tuneful woods
For ever flourish; and thy vales look gay
With painted meadows and the golden grain!
Oft, with thy blooming sons, when life was new,
Sportive and petulant and charm'd with toys,
In thy transparent eddies have I laved:
Oft traced with patient steps thy fairy banks,
With the well imitated fly to hook
The eager trout, and with the slender line
And yielding rod solicit to the shore
The struggling panting prey; while vernal clouds
And tepid gales obscured the ruffled pool,
And from the deeps call'd forth the wanton swarms.
Form'd on the Samian school, or those of Ind,
There are who think these pastimes scarce humane:
Yet in my mind (and not relentless I)
His life is pure that wears no fouler stains.
But if through genuine tenderness of heart,
Or secret want of relish for the game,
You shun the glories of the chase, nor care
To haunt the peopled stream; the garden yields
A soft amusement, a humane delight.
To raise the' insipid nature of the ground;
Or tame its savage genius to the grace
Of careless sweet rusticity, that seems
The amiable result of happy chance
Is to create; and gives a godlike joy,
Which every year improves. Nor thou disdain
To check the lawless riot of the trees,
To plant the grove, or turn the barren mould.
O happy he! whom, when his years decline
(His fortune and his fame by worthy means
Attain'd, and equal to his moderate mind;
His life approved by all the wise and good,
E'en envied by the vain), the peaceful groves
Of Epicurus, from this stormy world,
Receive to rest; of all ungrateful cares
Absolved, and sacred from the selfish crowd.
Happiest of men! if the same soil invites
A chosen few, companions of his youth,
Once fellow rakes perhaps, now rural friends;
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