Shall counterfeit the motions of the flood, And drown him in her dry and dusty gulphs. What then!-were they the wicked above all, And we the righteous, whose fast anchored isle Moved not, while their's was rocked, like a light skiff, The sport of every wave? No: none are clear, And none than we more guilty. But, where all Stand chargeable with guilt, and to the shafts Of wrath obnoxious, God may choose his mark: May punish, if he please, the less, to warn The more malignant. If he spared not them, Tremble and be amazed at thine escape, Far guiltier England, lest he spare not thee! Happy the man, who sees a God employed In all the good and ill, that chequer life! Resolving all events, with their effects And manifold results, into the will And arbitration wise of the Supreme.
Did not his eye rule all things, and intend The least of our concerns (since from the least The greatest oft originate); could chance Find place in his dominion, or dispose One lawless particle to thwart his plan; Then God might be surprised, and unforeseen Contingence might alarm him, and disturb The smooth and equal course of his affairs. This truth philosophy, though eagle eyed In nature's tendencies, oft overlooks; And, having found his instrument, forgets, Or disregards, or, more presumptuous still,
Denies the power, that wields it. God proclaims His hot displeasure against foolish men, That live an atheist life: involves the heaven In tempests: quits his grasp upon the winds, And gives them all their fury: bids a plague Kindle a fiery boil upon the skin,
And putrify the breath of blooming health. He, calls for famine, and the meagre fiend Blows mildew from between his shrivelled lips, And taints the golden ear. He springs his mines, And desolates a nation at a blast.
Forth steps the spruce philosopher, and tells Of homogeneal and discordant springs And principles; of causes, how they work By necessary laws their sure effects; Of action and re-action. He has found The source of the disease, that nature feels, And bids the world take heart and banish fear.
Thou fool! will thy discovery of the cause
Suspend the effect, or heal it?
Still wrought by means since first he made the world? And did he not of old employ his means
To drown it? What is his creation less Than a capacious reservoir of means Formed for his use, and ready at his will?
Go, dress thine eyes with eye-salve; ask of him, Or ask of whomsoever he has taught;
And learn, though late, the genuine cause of all. England, with all thy faults, I love thee still-- My country! and, while yet a nook is left,
Where English minds and manners may be found, Shall be constrained to love thee. Though thy clime Be fickle, and thy year most part deformed With dripping rains, or withered by a frost, I would not yet exchange thy sullen skies, And fields without a flower, for warmer France With all her vines; nor for Ausonia's groves Of golden fruitage, and her myrtle bowers. To shake thy senate, and from heights sublime Of patriot eloquence to flash down fire Upon thy foes, was never meant my task: But I can feel thy fortunes, and partake Thy joys and sorrows, with as true a heart As any thunderer there. And I can feel Thy follies too; and with a just disdain Frown at effeminates, whose very looks Reflect dishonour on the land I love. How, in the name of soldiership and sense, Should England prosper, when such things as smooth And tender as a girl, all essenced over With odours, and as profligate as sweet;
Who sell their laurel for a myrtle wreath, And love when they should fight; when such as these
Presume to lay their hand upon the ark
Of her magnificent and awful cause?
Time was when it was praise and boast enough In every clime, and travel where we might, That we were born her children. Praise enough To fill the ambition of a private man,
That Chatham's language was his mother tongue,
And Wolfe's great name compatriot with his own. Farewell those honours, and farewell with them The hope of such hereafter! They have fallen Each in his field of glory; one in arms, And one in council-Wolfe upon the lap Of smiling victory that moment won, And Chatham heart-sick of his country's shame! They made us many soldiers. Chatham, still Consulting England's happiness at home, Secured it by an unforgiving frown,
If any wronged her. Wolfe, wherever he fought, Put so much of his heart into his act,
That his example had a magnet's force,
And all were swift to follow whom all loved. Those suns are set. Oh rise some other such! Or all that we have left is empty talk Of old achievements, and despair of new.
Now hoist the sail, and let the streamers float Upon the wanton breezes. Strew the deck With lavender, and sprinkle liquid sweets, That no rude savour maritime invade The nose of nice nobility! Breathe soft Ye clarionets; and softer still ye flutes; That winds and waters, lulled by magic sounds, May bear us smoothly to the Gallic shore! True, we have lost an empire-let it pass. True; we may thank the perfidy of France, That picked the jewel out of England's crown, With all the cunning of an envious, shrew. And let that pass 'twas but a trick of state!
A brave man knows no malice, but at once Forgets in peace the injuries of war, And gives his direst foe a friend's embrace. And, shamed as we have been, to the very beard Braved and defied, and in our own sea proved Too weak for those decisive blows, that once Ensured us mastery there, we yet retain Some small pre-eminence; we justly boast At least superior jockeyship, and claim The honours of the turf as all our own! Go then, well worthy of the praise ye seek, And show the shame, ye might conceal at home, In foreign eyes! be grooms and win the plate, Where once your nobler fathers won a crown!- 'Tis generous to communicate your skill To those that need it. Folly is soon learned: And under such preceptors who can fail! There is a pleasure in poetic pains,
Which only poets know. The shifts and turns, The expedients and inventions multiform, To which the mind resorts, in chase of terms Though apt, yet coy, and difficult to win- To arrest the fleeting images, that fill The mirror of the mind, and hold them fast, And force them sit, till he has penciled off A faithful likeness of the forms he views; Then to dispose his copies with such art, That each may find its most propitious light, And shine by situation, hardly less
Than by the labour and the skill it cost;
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