In darkness dwell, with fear and headlong rout; Of vice in league with folly. These subdued, And lo! the Goddess radiant on her throne. The clouds dissolve, by misty error rolled Round human thought, and doubt and dread are flown; Truth smiles, well pleased, on Virtue at her side; And bright eyed Beauty, pleasure's rosy bride, Comes, joy-attended, to pale fear unknown. METAPHYSICS. I. "My mind is my kingdom"- then surely 'tis meet Long time, I laboured in the darksome mine In error; fruitful more, in thoughts profound No narrow range my ardent search could bound ; My eager quest, through realms of thought afar, Mid gloom of darkness, o'er entangled ground, With subtle disputants, in wordy war, So doubt but lead, at last, to doctrines sound. Each rising light I hailed, each wandering star, Thy sons, O Genius! blazing bright around, So bright, alas! they dazzle and confound, II. Though hard the soil, and cold the clime may be, And rich the products studious toil may gain Hobbes' startling paradox, and power intense The rugged ore of Butler's sterling sense; Reid's power of patient thought, devoid of art; Of human nature, and the world within ; That central height sublime, where spreading wide, In varied prospect, seen on every side, Thy realms, O Thought! lie clear and bright below. ORIGINAL GENIUS. I. I will not jump with common spirits, Nor rank me with the barbarous multitudes. SHAKSPEARE. Hobbes' said, nor need we here his speech gainsay, I should have known as little!" Prone to stray, Traced even his own thoughts; no babble vain But clear, precise, with pregnant meaning fraught, In other minds, the germs of living thought; And that the noblest; reason's power alone, The hard, dry intellect, to him was known, Unconscious, or disdainful of the heart. II. Though Wit, in pleasure's laughing bower, Tis Contemplation's lonely hour Genius is nursed in solitude: the mind, Turned inward on itself, intently draws, From close observance of thought's inmost laws, The nature, structure, wants of human kind. Here first wakes Genius, offspring rare, combined Of head and heart, of thought that overawes, With deep intensest feeling closely joined. Hence truths unborrowed, thoughts in words once breathed, That glow with life, to latest time bequeathed. Drawn from this centre of enduring thought, Flow streams perennial: hence hath beauty, fraught Her lasting laurels, wide as land and main, IMITATION. True to the jingling of our leader's bells. COWPER. Genius draws truth from nature: her impress, Where custom leads, the beaten track pursue, Copies of copies, shadows of a shade, By each transmission still more worthless made. MORAL TRUTH. I. Wherefore burns In mortal bosom this unquenched hope, AKENSIDE. In Moral Truths alone man's nature finds His highest powers' developement: these ask His utmost stretch, to compass their high task, And reach in, virtuous action, all that binds, In firm yet gentle bonds, the noblest minds; Of error's maze, man sinks, subdued by pain, II. With Meekness of Wisdom. ST. JAMES. The prophet stood on Horeb; and the force A power volcanic, bursting from the source Of central fires, that shook earth's solid frame : God was not in the earthquake, or the flame. Next fell, on the veiled prophet's awe struck ear, A STILL SMALL VOICE, in accents mild as clear, And God was there. His ways are still the same; In gentle whispers, to wise hearts that hear, Truth speaks, else mute; her voice is seldom found Inferior powers are boisterous; Truth alone |