And think who best may taste them! Oh, not ye
Ambition's restless minions! dupes and fools
To unsubstantial good, for which, methinks,
'Tis but a licens'd madness in mankind
To barter life, health, happiness :—not ye !—
Nor ye, the sons of pleasure-such the name,
As in deep scorn and mockery, which ye bear-
Who sink beneath the weight of splendid woe,
Martyrs to languid lassitude! nor ye,
Who look on simpler and sincerer mirth
As all too rude, unpolish'd, unrefin❜d,
Too true to boisterous nature, for a taste
So nicely dull, so exquisitely dead,
So fitly blunted and benumb'd as yours.
Be wretched, then, according to the rules
Who may not laugh, since laughter would destroy
The dainty grace of your gentility!
Since the keen relish of pure joys might spoil
Your elegant vacuity of face,
Your stiff placidity of voice and mien,
With coarse distortions; break your useless life's
Listless monotony; and ruffle o'er
The dark stagnation of your pompous pride.
Never in court or palace such delights
Abound-they flourish not in princely domes:
The halls of grandeur are not halls of joy.
But in the cottage, by its inmates now
Dispos'd with pleasing half religious care,
The holly and the laurel are entwin'd,
And the red berries on the casement hang,
And from the roof! They on the oaken floor
Tread with no mincing step,' no languid air,
But throw their very souls into the dance.
Or 'neath the misletoe's mysterious bough,
Flush'd by the genial licence of the time,
And skill'd in rites which Druids never dreamt,
Taste sweet endearments-innocent as sweet-
And rude, but not unenviable, mirth.
Or, tir'd with pleasure's exercise, they sit 置
All circled round the hearthstone; while, for them,
The homely wine, prest from the elder's juice,
Imparts to humble hearts a purer joy
Than Chian or Falernian ever gave.
Such were the good old pastimes of their sires, Thine own, thine only, England! may they still Cleave to the soil, and bless as they have blest! For with such pastimes blends the human heart, Its best and deepest feelings!
Loud whistling, dashes madly on the rocks
Old ocean's foam-while sea and sky look black,
And shrill afar the startled sea-mew screams,
To see th' eternal elements at strife-
Still the rude ship-boy, on the midnight main,
When Christmas comes, or on the giddy mast
Thinks of his country, and his far-off friends,
And home, and hearth, and most familiar fire,
And all who once sat round it: mother, sire,
Sister, or one yet dearer :-or on deck
Half gay, half pensive, mid his messmates, quaff's
Unto the health of those belov'd, and pours
Libations to the spirit of the time.
Ev'n in the prison revelry resounds:
The captive culprit, on this festal day,
Beyond the meagre fare ordain'd to be
A captive's portion, drinks, with thirsty lip,'
Some heart refreshing beverage, tastes once more
Some little luxury, too long disused;
And half forgetting where and what he is,
Wishes all good to all-and vainly dreams
Of innocence and happiness again.
Yet is he wretched still-nor only he-
Now the sad debtor shrinks from ev'ry sound,
And trembles as the door creaks-still he fears
A summons to the prison; or, perchance,
With desperate haste he hies him from his home,
And for his health, forsooth! must taste the air
Of balmy France; and live long dark'ning years
Of pains, and fears, and exile, and disgrace.
Now thousand wretches, cold and half congeal'd,
Shiver along the street with scarce a rag
To wrap around their feeble tott'ring frames,
Nor aught of hardly nourishment to cheer
The languid pulse, and spread internal heat.
And they-oh God! how pitiably forlorn!
The houseless women, spectral frozen forms,
The ghosts of dissipation, who for days
Have scarcely tasted one good wholesome meal,
Nor know they when and where shall be their next :-
They, at this holy time, when Christ was born,
May make their strongest, last appeal to man,
And in the name, and for the sake of Christ,
Ask of their fellow Christians charity.
And, ah! man cannot be content with joy,
But mars, and by pursuing it so far,
Loses the good he aims at:
To Bacchanal sports and gluttonous excess,
And Saturnalian deep debauch, which brings
Its punishment for ever at its back.
Without, I hear the drunkard reeling home,
Uttering his frenzied blasphemies and oaths,
And horrible ejaculations loud,
Because he cannot stagger straight; or else
In maudlin height of universal love
{And universal kindness, he grasps
The greasy palm of ev'ry passer by,
As if the friend of childhood. Most he joys,
Singing with broken notes some amorous catch,
To meet some fellow drunkard, who has turn'd
This holy festival to vilest use,
As loud of voice, as impotent of foot,
As sunk in beastly licence as himself.
Full soon he falls, and stretch'd at pow'rless length,
Asks the sour watchman's half unwilling aid;
Or sleeps and groans at intervals :-meanwhile
The night, tho' cold, shines on his wilder'd head
Starlight and beautiful:-nor vapourish haze
Obscures the bright disk of the wintry moon.
But sadder still, as more extended, views
And darker sounds arise-I think on man,
As man is even now throughout the world!-
Yes, on his natal day the dreadful thought
Will come, that Christ has lived, not died, in vain.
Since the sublime example of his life
Is lost unto mankind: for now, ey'n now,
All prey on all, as if each several man
Was something from his fellow quite distinct,
And formed for mutual hatred. Envy, spleen,
And mole-eyed selfishness, and deadly rage,
Turn man to worse than brutes. The madd'ning storm
Of wild tempestuous passions sweeps along :-
The moral hurricane, which scatters far
Horror and wretchedness-to fragments tears
Nature's own image, and deforms the globe.
All gracious God! tho' twice nine hundred years Have pass'd o'er man, since he, their source of faith, Lived as a lesson, died a sacrifice,
The humble, and the meek,-the present God;-
Yet full, as man, of human sympathies,
And shedding human tears-still, even still,
Wide-wasting war, with its unnumbered ills,
The havoc, and the rapine, and the shock,
And most unchristian trophies, onward drives
The ploughshare of destruction; with his scythe
Mangles the fair creation of the world,
And bids the rvers run with human gore :-
As if man found his mortal life too long,
Too tranquil, and too happy! or, as if
Nor time, nor nature, could enough destroy !
The bravo's triumph and the hero's fame,
Cradled and nurst in carnage, yet survive.
Men deem it triumph to heap blood on blood,
Disaster on disaster, death on death,
Yet call themselves Christ's followers! Still the heart
Shudders, and shrinks from what the mind foresees;
And sickens at the worse than heathen deeds
In Christian lands, or done, or to be done!
Thou Prince of Peace-thou God, whose law is love,
How art thou mock'd! Both peace and love are gone!
Europe still bleeds with wounds unheal'd, unstaunch'd,
She languishes with long disease, and groans
Or for the past, or for th' impending woes.
Eternal Saviour! from thy throne in heav'n
Seest thou the things of earth-seest thou the deeds
Which with the sanction of thy name, are done!
Scarce rolls a month, but kings are met in league
To rob whole nations of their rights as men ;
While nations arm themselves against their kings,
Grown wild with freedom's frenzy. When the world
Might be one family, one band of friends,
Monarchs will not permit it :-but conspire
To bar from all society some realm
That could not have its citizens be slaves!
And shall this never cease? Oh, God! once more
Look down on kings and kingdoms :—and while thus
They bear the Christian name, thus call on Christ
As on their friend, deliverer, hope, and guide,
Engraft the Christian feeling on their minds,
And pour the Christian spirit o'er their hearts!
We wanted some light poetry from Urbanus, as a sort of Christmas present to our younger readers: but he has been too busy to favour us with any thing more than the following imitation of his favourite poet.
L. 1, CARMEN XI. AD LEUCONOEN.
Tu ne quæsieris (scire nefas) quem mihi, quem tibi
Tinem Di dederint, Leuconoë, neu Babylonios
Tentáris numeros. Ut melius, quidquid erit, pati!
Seu plures hyemes, seu tribuit Jupiter ultimam,
Quæ nunc oppositis debilitat pumicibus mare
Tyrrhenum. Sapias, vina liques, et spatio brevi
Spem longam reseces. Dum loquimur, fugerit invida
Ætas. Carpe diem, quam minimùm credula postero.
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