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A RHAPSODY. A POEM.
NEW-YORK: PRINTED BY HODGE, ALLEN, AND CAMPBELL. M, DCC, LXXXIX.
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THE following POEM is selected from a variety of scraps, which were composed in the fervour of imagination, as the different subjects presented themselves to the Author. He has endeavoured, as much as possible, to arrange them in some dependence on each other; but a Work of this nature will necessarily be imperfect and irregular. The Author has not the presumption to suppose, that an insignificant Poem, so entirely destitute of incident, can ever be an object of general regard: To the few, however, who are finely sensible of the beauties of nature, who are pleased with something more than the music of poetry, he dedicates his performance; and to those only he would recommend the perusal of it.
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A RHAPSODY.
OCTOBER.
NUNC FORMOSISSIMUS ANNUS.—
Virg.
SUBJECTS.—A morning's walk—Imperfect description of the country on the coast of New-Jersey—Address to nature—Shooting censured—Change of scene, with a description of a storm in autumn—Succeeding serenity of weather—Apostrophe to the sun.
UPON the dewy landscape op'ning wide,
The joyous morn now issues; and I rise
Refreshen'd from repose, as the bright sun,
Ascending in his azure course, uplifts
My meditation to the farthest heav'n.
The glist'ning meadows seem to breathe a-new
In fragrant exhalations; while the fogs,
In their retreat collected, gather round
The distant hills, whose summits unobscur'd
In variegated foliage clad
Rise 'mid the lustre of th' autumnal sky.
—And now the whole perspective bright'ning
Through its extent, discovers a serene
And boundless day. Through ev'ry sense inspir'd
With animation, in the pathless field
I stroll delighted; or, above the vale,
[Page 4] Pause on the rising hill to dwell at ease
On the rich profusion of its increase,
Where, in extended rows and ripening
To the beams of autumn, the tufted corn
Wave their dejected crests, and the orchard
Intermingled, eminent in its growth,
Bends beneath the golden fruit:—And here too
Encircling woods, that with uneven bounds
Design the neighb'ring farms and circumscribe
The toils of husbandry, afford a range
For contemplation, where unmolested
By the gaze of rustic curiosity,
And in the windings of the leafy glade
I vent unheard th' emotions of my breast.
—In these blest hours, when nature's placid charms
Reflect serene complacence o'er my soul,
Wisdom step forth, and with an energy
Impress thy strongest lessons on my heart—
Truths, which through all the turbulence of life,
The impulse of blind passions, and the wiles
Of vice alluring, or unmanly sloth,
May hold a firm unalterable sway.
Around me, with impervious intercourse
Of wood, the forest terminates in shade,
Or in a series of decreasing trunks
Above invested with promiscuous garbs;
Save where, apart, and in stately silence,
The sapless oak with majesty exalts
[Page 5] Its venerable limbs, leafless with years
And with'ring in the last decay—or save
Where, in unfrequent interstice, amid
The broken foliage delicately ting'd
With autumns mellow saffron, intervenes
A prospect of ethereal azure.
How oft delighted with the wild attire
Of nature in her recesses, thro' scenes
Like these, in roving childhood have I strav'd,
Aw'd with the gloom and desart solitude
That environ'd me! or, musing on some tale
Of magic wonders, in the sunny heights
And sylvan hills have pictur'd to myself
The mansions of fantastic Genii.
What tho' I trace not in these happy climes
The fam'd luxuriance of Arcadian vales,
Spontaneous gardens or parterre's enrich'd
With lavish culture and the pride of taste;
There is a rude disorder in these wilds,
A native grandeur, that unaffected
By the touch of art, transcends its graces
And strikes some finer sense within the soul.
Nature—sweet parent of unenvied bliss,
Constant, lib'ral benefactress, whose charms
For chaste and loveliest simplicity
Fill thy admirers with renew'd delights
That never pall the taste. We need not boast
The smiles of partial fortune, or the rights
Of affluence to enjoy thy bounties—
[Page 6] They're the common heritage of us all,
In thee the outcast of society
Will find a refuge from his miseries,
A soothing and unalter'd friend; and th' hand
That on the bosom of th' adjacent hills
Guides his lone plough, eyeing as he proceeds,
With a glance of heart-felt satisfaction,
The cerulean bay that gently fluctuates
Mid the surrounding auburn woods, in thee
Unconscious feels a sweet'ner of
[...] toil.
—And is it not enough that bounteous heav'n
Has strung our feeling to a harmony
So exquisite with nature, that we seek,
In merciless invasion on the lives
Of helpless brutes, a transport from their pangs.
How ardent! with what earnestness of hope
Yon sportsman takes the field! on ev'ry side
In studious survey, upon the haunts
Where crouch the timid quail intent, he starts
With eager trepidation at the flight,
Sudden and son'rous as the bevy springs—
Then aims the fatal instrument; and flies
In fiercest exultation to secure
The fallen victim, flutt'ring in the wound
And struggling with the agonies of death.
O sensibility! to whom the plaint
Of suff'ring innocence ne'er sigh'd in vain,
Rise, with conviction, rise in its defence
And pluck this savage instinct from our breasts.
[Page 7] But, from such wanton cruelties averse,
Still let me linger on the happy smiles
Of autumn all benign, when tranquil most
With ceaseless pleasure then most inviting.
Here scent the morning fragrance of her gales,
The noon enjoy, and watch her parting beams,
That spread a mild effulgence in the west,
From the faint yellow blushing into red.
But soon the transitory scene is rob'd
Of all its beauties and enliv'ning charms,
As from the east in threat'ning gloom involv'd
Ascends the gather'd tempest—the drear clouds
Lowering move onward, while beneath them
Flies a light mist precipitate and wild.
From th' interrupted labours of the day
The swain retires; in sad society
The domestic broods assemble pensive;
And thro' the lonely fields no creature stirs,
Where in deep silence ev'ry voice is hush'd,
Save the shrill gulls, that wasted from the coast
Soar in promiscuous circles o'er the land
And meet the terrors of th' impending storm.
At first the wand'ring clouds emit a rare
Uncertain show'r, or on the mountains side
Pour down in streams collected and oblique—
Wide and more wide the thick'ning deluge spreads,
Till the whole earth's o'erwhelm'd and floats immense.
How chang'd the prospect, where I lately dwelt
[Page 8] With glowing admiration, seen dimly
Thro' the fleeting rain! the valleys hidden,
And the tall hills grown desolate and dun,
Seem mingled with the clouds in sullen forms,
A brooding vapour hangs before the sight,
And spreads its gloomy shadow on the mind.
—Methinks within the center of yon wood,
Fearful and dark, while thrilling midnight reigns,
Some way-worn, solitary traveller
Wanders bewildered: around him beats
The drifting rain; the cheerless hollow blast
Moans among the trees; and the upland rocks,
That vent a hoarsely-sounding cataract,
Deepen the sadness of a double night.
But towards the morn, rising from a gale,
Comes on the fierce north-west—it intermits,
As to collect new force; and then breaks forth
With more unbridled vengeance, its madness
Venting on the world. Shaken to its base
The firm mansion totters; the stately woods
Succumbing roar; and the wide ocean
Convulsed unto its profoundest caverns
Swells to tremendous heights, that hurried on
In dread contortion foam before the wind,
And burst with thundering torrents on the shore.
Now let me climb some mountains stormy cliffs
Sublime and black as the disorder'd face
[Page 9] Of heav'n, envelop'd in an eddying cloud
Of foliage, torn by distracting whirlwinds
From the forest: and, while all nature round
Is agitated in tempestuous din,
Calm and undismay'd let me give a loose
To fancy; eye the wild struggling prospect,
And listen to the uproar of the wind.
But soon o'er half the horizon looks forth
A lively day. The remnants of the storm,
Condens'd into innumerable clouds,
Recede with swiftness from th' aerial force
And cast a sweeping shadow as they pass,
Till th' azure's left unchequer'd and serene.
Happy AMERICA, whose regions pure
Are ne'er benighted in the sadd'ning gloom
Of dismal fogs and unremitting rains!
Thy days of mourning quickly pass away;
And soon thy native brightness is restor'd.
How grateful and reviving is the breath
Of the untainted atmosphere! how vast
And how sublime the majesty that reigns
In the cerulean, pure expanse!—And thou,
O source incomprehensible of light,
Who unfoldest to our view the regions
Of this sphere, and giv'st the mind an insight
Into the grandeur of the universe;
How delightful to me is thy presence!
E'en in the fairest moments of this life
Thou can'st inspire a cheerfulness of soul
[Page 10] And give a lustre to my inmost joys.
Or, when embosom'd in profoundest grief,
One gracious ray from thee can animate
My sad desponding breast, uplift my views
To happier scenes and brighten ev'ry hope.
NOVEMBER.
MISCE ERCO ALIQUID NOSTRIS DE MORIBUS.—
Juv.
SUBJECTS.—Winter—View of the city—Satirical sketch of fashionable life—Drunkenness reproved—Funeral—Pleasures of study—Moonlight—Aurora borealis—emotions of love.
HAPPY are they, who from th' inclemency
Of piercing winds and wintry solitude,
Within the bosom of a friendlier clime
And amid the city's gaily varied scenes,
Call forth to exercise each spring of joy;
While the stern year bids vegetation cease,
Or in a mantle of concreted snow
Involves the subject world, and to the eye
Presents a comfortless unbounded waste.
So too the muse, averting from the scene
That late with rapture tun'd her song, amid
The circling pleasures and the splendid haunts
[Page 11] Of dissipation, may enjoy a theme
More animate—But she disdains to sing
With
praise unfelt, emotions not her own.
How many here unconscious of the fruits
Ripen'd and dignified, that wealth can yield,
Imprison'd within their habitations
Consume the day in revelries and sloth;
Or in a proud magnificence, but draw
A tasteless, uniform, voluptuous life!
To them the fragrance of the blushing morn
Has lost its inspiration—but, wearied
With the drowsiness of midnight riot
Sickening and relax'd, their lengthen'd slumbers
Drown the better half of their existence.
Nature points out to man his earthly course:
Tis impious to invert her sacred laws;
And whose dares,—errs to his destruction.
Sweeter and more enviable the meal
Of him who rises from his bed of straw
To early industry—or e'en the hag's,
That near some windy corner shiv'ring fits
In doleful contemplation on her wares,
And mouths by stealth the fare of penury—
More dainty than the choicest luxuries
That reek upon the tables of the great,
While oe'r their limbs a torpid langour reigns,
And the cloy'd stomach sickens at the food.
—They rise not to restore their weaken'd frame
[Page 12] And by the strength'ning powers of exercise
Give a robust alacrity to life,—
But, midst a round of vacant visitants,
Pleas'd with the dignities of fortune, sit
To waste the noon in stately stiffness, vain
And pompous ceremony, the outside
Of society.—A strict demeanor,
Reserve and deference to distinction,
Can never want an advocate to speak
Their need: But if the arrogance of pride
Will fetter me with those severe constraints,
Mere
pedantry in breeding could impose,
I fly such awful majesty and seek
A refuge within an humbler circle,
Where ease and freedom yet maintain their worth,
Though heighten'd by the arts of polish'd life.
Nor rising from meridian fare, frugal
And simple, does my envy follow those,
Who, mounted in their sounding vehicles,
Are borne along the trembling streets, in all
The consequence of lordly indolence,
To taste the dainties of a rich repast
Where all the costliness of wealth's display'd;
Or perhaps an annual feast, profuse
And gaily decorated, a garden
Of florescent delicacies, invites
The powder'd host, who with reflection grave
A while confer; then in due form array'd
[Page 13]
[...]vade the smiling board.—
—Now the desires
[...]f coarser appetite remov'd, each breast
[...]ows with the charms of converse undisturb'd;
And, as the bottle circles, by degrees
[...] ripens into friendliness, and spreads
[...]onvivial harmony.—The crimson cheek
Now flushes with a finer warmth; the eye
Swims in delight; while the inspiring voice
With strains of merriment and toping tales
[...]alls forth the jocund sallies of applause;
Or, warbling some melodious elegy,
Awakes each tender, gen'rous sentiment.
But as the summer's sun, that from the east,
Beams forth benign, and in his limpid course
Ascending, brightens into ardent day—
Then sits in thunder and a night of clouds.
So the infatuating charm, at first
Diffuses a sweet influence o'er the mind,
And, kindling into extacies, is lost,
Whelm'd in the boiling phrenzy of the brain.
To calm discourse and animating wit
Succeeds a wild vociferous jargon;
And drowning ev'ry lay, the full chorus
Shouts in distracting clamorous discord.
—Before their sight the glimm'ring objects wheel
In sick'ning rounds; and the head simp'ring nods
With liftless inclination, till by fits
Resign'd to brooding impotence, it droops
[Page 14] A sullen, senseless, pitiable load.
—Blush, ye deluded men, who in an age
So boasted and so wise as this, delight
In base intoxication; who barter
For the price of momentary transport
A series of your choicest hours; whose joys
Degrade the great faculties of the mind,
Corrupt the very springs of life, and throw
A loathsome curse upon posterity.
Rouse, rouse, COLUMBIANS, burst through the shackles
Of a Gothic custom, that would pervert
The noblest purpose of your existence.
Tis not the giddy transitory flight
Of
borrowed transport and empoison'd bliss—
Nor all th' high-season'd sweets of luxury,
That wisdom covets; but 'tis th' enjoyment
Of
ourselves, pure, permanent and perfect—
There is a treasure, far beyond the reach
Of groveling taste, or the pride of affluence,
That costs you nothing to enjoy—Temp'rance—
'Tis not the studied work of art refin'd,
Nor idly splendid to entice the vain;
But chaste and simple as the joy it yields.—
'Tis this, the loveliest offspring of want,
Sustains the balance with disdainful wealth;
That in the cottage of neglected worth,
With pitying consolation dwells,
Suffuses a mild sun-shine o'er the breast,
[Page 15]
[...], in the tranquil labour of the day,
[...] a night of undisturb'd repose.
Temperance! ah! no. It is a phantom:
[...] such a picture elsewhere scarce subsists
[...] in the airy dreams of poetry.
[...] search it thro' all orders, to the wretch
[...] from his hungry, tatter'd family,
[...] their lean, weekly sustenance, the fruit
[...] many weary and repining hours—
[...] lavish it in one unfeeling draught,
[...] in inebriating consumes him.
Of this enough—it is a growing theme;
[...], as the eye matures, in its increase,
[...] yield a plenteous and a baneful crop.
Now, while in the red'ning descent of day
[...] busy clangors of the world are sunk,
[...] thoughtful silence o'er the vacant streets,
[...]pending beckons to congenial night;
[...] the sacred columns of yon church
With folded arms, and in a vision wrapt
[...] holy inspiration, let me muse—
[...] when th' expanding portals, at the close
[...] weekly prayer, pour forth obstreperous
[...] gay, vivacious, hastening multitude;
[...] as the slow and lengthening procession,
With the death-like weeds of mourning blacken'd,
[...], with funeral pace, to the dread seat
[...] an eternal rest; and in the deep
Stillness of its approach, the frequent knell
[Page 16] Bursting from the sounding belfry, vibrates
On my thrill'd ear at solemn intervals—
Ah me! it tolls Amelia's loss—the sound
Slow swinging breathes a deploring dulness
O'er the scene; and, as the last peal expires
Upon the gale, her native hills return
A lingering, melancholy echo.
Then welcome darkness, gloomy nourisher
Of despondence, whose kind dominion checks
The wand'ring thought, and by concealment swells
The pathetic tenderness of sorrow.
—Far, from all the senseless vanities
Of ostentatious wealth, the noisy seats
Of its mistaken pleasures, sequester'd
And by the world unnotic'd, let me taste
The sweets of science, and hold a converse
With sage instructors of mankind. Teach me
Immortal Fenelon, in the midlest
Language of thy Mentor, greatly to spurn
The splendid fallacies, the worthless fame
That weak ambition courts; and fix my hopes
On the firm base of rectitude and truth.
Fill'd with the greatness of thy precepts too
First of philosophers
*, whose mind secure
In immortality, serenely rose
Above the fears of death—from the glories
Of thy example, let me catch one ray
[Page 17]
[...] Grecian wisdom, and, at a distance,
[...]ollow thee with humble emulation.
With thee, great Newton, in sublimest thought,
Above the servile limits of this sphere,
Let me explore the infinite designs
[...]f Providence; systems of unknown worlds,
[...]ast harmonious, thro' the endless void
Ascending in stupendous series;
[...]ill lost in the unbounded range of being,
[...]iddy with amazement, my fluttered mind
[...]rinks int' herself and trembles at the flight.
[...] But from the drowsy lassitude of thought
And irksome application, may I find
[...] refuge in the liveliest strains of Pope;
[...]raceful, yet familiar, and, tho' confin'd
To the close shackles of oppressive rhyme,
Flowing, precise and delicately smooth.
And oft let Otway melt me with the voice
Of plaintive love: or let Shakespeare chill me
With the dread narrative of black designs
And midnight murder; rouse my indif'rent breast
To vengeance on some exulting tyrant;
And now touch the quickest sense of pity
In the despair of exquisite distress.
—If such the wond'rous, facinating pow'rs
That fancy, e'en in
fiction can display,
Oh! that th' auspicious genius of this age
Would give a second Homer to the world.
[Page 18] Where verse, disdaining the ignoble tracks,
The futile, hackney'd themes of poetry,
Persuasive—irresistable, would raise
His voice to the sublimest cause of
truth,
And sing those virtues that a SAVIOUR taught!
Inspiring angels should attune his lays
With melody celestial, should impart
The strongest energy of expression,
And swell th' aspiring tumults of his soul.
But if the seats where levity presides
In dazzling pomp, or the convivial shouts
Of mirth ne'er lure me from the pleasing calm
Of philosophic pleasures; ever charm'd
With nature, be whate'er her varied shape,
In heav'nly contemplation let me gaze
Upon the silver orb of the full moon,
As she rides in her serenest zenith,
Amid the stately solitude of heav'n,
And on the glossy snow reflects a soft
And silken lustre—or as from the north,
The gelid seat of winter's frozen throne,
A stream of dawning light ascending, wide
Diffuses o'er the painted firmament
Its crimson glories—an untimely morn,
Beauteous, glowing and diversified,
High traverses th' illumin'd vault, and hides
Its blooming course behind the eastern clouds.
And oft to shun the vacant tediousness
[Page 19] Of ev'ning, let me recline in converse sweet
[...] ever charming—by thy side;
And, while I catch from sympathetic sighs
The fond emotions swelling in thy breast,
Feel thro' my veins transporting passion throb
With extacy tumultous, or melting
Into the fondest tenderness of love,
[...]ose my enchanted soul in Paradise.
[...]h! no—infatuating dream! the hand
[...]f rigid fortune rudely intervenes,
[...]nd wrests me from the fondest smiles of hope.
Thus, oft the voyager by wintry winds,
[...]ost thro' the perils and tempestuous lengths
[...]f the Atlantic, with ardent rapture
Breathes the aromatic south, and, rising
Above the placid bosom of the deep,
Beholds the happy prospect of his home—
When, on a sudden, from the boist'rous west,
Deceitfully serene, the latent storm
Precipitates with tremendous violence,
And ev'ry hope confounding, o'er his sight
Spreads the dark image of eternal night.
FINIS.