Oh for a lodge in some vast wilderness,

Some boundless contiguity of shade,

Where rumour of oppression and deceit,

Of unsuccessful or successful war,

Might never reach me more! My ear is pained,

My soul is sick with every day’s report

Of wrong and outrage with which earth is filled.

There is no flesh in man’s obdurate heart,

It does not feel for man. The natural bond

Of brotherhood is severed as the flax

That falls asunder at the touch of fire.

He finds his fellow guilty of a skin

Not coloured like his own, and having power

To enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause

Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey.

Lands intersected by a narrow frith

Abhor each other. Mountains interposed

Make enemies of nations, who had else

Like kindred drops been mingled into one.

Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys;

And worse than all, and most to be deplored,

As human nature’s broadest, foulest blot,

Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat

With stripes, that mercy, with a bleeding heart,

Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast.

Then what is man? And what man, seeing this,

And having human feelings, does not blush

And hang his head, to think himself a man?

I would not have a slave to till my ground,

To carry me, to fan me while I sleep,

And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth

That sinews bought and sold have ever earned.

No: dear as freedom is, and in my heart’s

Just estimation prized above all price,

I had much rather be myself the slave

And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him.

We have no slaves at home—then why abroad?

And they themselves, once ferried o’er the wave

That parts us, are emancipate and loosed.

Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs

Receive our air, that moment they are free,

They touch our country and their shackles fall.

That’s noble, and bespeaks a nation proud

And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then,

And let it circulate through every vein

Of all your empire; that where Britain’s power

Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too.

Sure there is need of social intercourse,

Benevolence and peace and mutual aid,

Between the nations, in a world that seems

To toll the death-bell to its own decease;

And by the voice of all its elements

To preach the general doom. When were the winds

Let slip with such a warrant to destroy?

When did the waves so haughtily o’erleap

Their ancient barriers, deluging the dry?

Fires from beneath and meteors from above,

Portentous, unexampled, unexplained,

Have kindled beacons in the skies, and the old

And crazy earth has had her shaking fits

More frequent, and foregone her usual rest.

Is it a time to wrangle, when the props

And pillars of our planet seem to fail,

And nature with a dim and sickly eye

To wait the close of all? But grant her end

More distant, and that prophecy demands

A longer respite, unaccomplished yet;

Still they are frowning signals, and bespeak

Displeasure in His breast who smites the earth

Or heals it, makes it languish or rejoice.

And ’tis but seemly, that, where all deserve

And stand exposed by common peccancy

To what no few have felt, there should be peace,

And brethren in calamity should love.

Alas for Sicily, rude fragments now

Lie scattered where the shapely column stood.

Her palaces are dust. In all her streets

The voice of singing and the sprightly chord

Are silent. Revelry and dance and show

Suffer a syncope and solemn pause,

While God performs, upon the trembling stage

Of His own works, His dreadful part alone.

How does the earth receive Him?—With what signs

Of gratulation and delight, her King?

Pours she not all her choicest fruits abroad,

Her sweetest flowers, her aromatic gums,

Disclosing paradise where’er He treads?

She quakes at His approach. Her hollow womb,

Conceiving thunders, through a thousand deeps

And fiery caverns roars beneath His foot.

The hills move lightly and the mountains smoke,

For He has touched them. From the extremest point

Of elevation down into the abyss,

His wrath is busy and His frown is felt.

The rocks fall headlong and the valleys rise,

The rivers die into offensive pools,

And, charged with putrid verdure, breathe a gross

And mortal nuisance into all the air.

What solid was, by transformation strange

Grows fluid, and the fixed and rooted earth

Tormented into billows, heaves and swells,

Or with vortiginous and hideous whirl

Sucks down its prey insatiable. Immense

The tumult and the overthrow, the pangs

And agonies of human and of brute

Multitudes, fugitive on every side,

And fugitive in vain. The sylvan scene

Migrates uplifted, and, with all its soil

Alighting in far-distant fields, finds out

A new possessor, and survives the change.

Ocean has caught the frenzy, and upwrought

To an enormous and o’erbearing height,

Not by a mighty wind, but by that voice

Which winds and waves obey, invades the shore

Resistless. Never such a sudden flood,

Upridged so high, and sent on such a charge,

Possessed an inland scene. Where now the throng

That pressed the beach and hasty to depart

Looked to the sea for safety? They are gone,

Gone with the refluent wave into the deep,

A prince with half his people. Ancient towers,

And roofs embattled high, the gloomy scenes

Where beauty oft and lettered worth consume

Life in the unproductive shades of death,

Fall prone: the pale inhabitants come forth,

And, happy in their unforeseen release

From all the rigours of restraint, enjoy

The terrors of the day that sets them free.

Who then, that has thee, would not hold thee fast,

Freedom! whom they that lose thee so regret,

That even a judgment, making way for thee,

Seems in their eyes a mercy, for thy sake.

Such evil sin hath wrought; and such a flame

Kindled in heaven, that it burns down to earth,

And, in the furious inquest that it makes

On God’s behalf, lays waste His fairest works.

The very elements, though each be meant

The minister of man to serve his wants,

Conspire against him. With his breath he draws

A plague into his blood; and cannot use

Life’s necessary means, but he must die.

Storms rise to o’erwhelm him: or, if stormy winds

Rise not, the waters of the deep shall rise,

And, needing none assistance of the storm,

Shall roll themselves ashore, and reach him there.

The earth shall shake him out of all his holds,

Or make his house his grave; nor so content,

Shall counterfeit the motions of the flood,

And drown him in her dry and dusty gulfs.

What then—were they the wicked above all,

And we the righteous, whose fast-anchored isle

Moved not, while theirs 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 putrefy 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 reaction. 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? Has not God

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 fortune, 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 o’er

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, where’er 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

Insured 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 pencilled 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,

Are occupations of the poet’s mind

So pleasing, and that steal away the thought

With such address from themes of sad import,

That, lost in his own musings, happy man!

He feels the anxieties of life, denied

Their wonted entertainment, all retire.

Such joys has he that sings. But ah! not such,

Or seldom such, the hearers of his song.

Fastidious, or else listless, or perhaps

Aware of nothing arduous in a task

They never undertook, they little note

His dangers or escapes, and haply find

There least amusement where he found the most.

But is amusement all? studious of song

And yet ambitious not to sing in vain,

I would not trifle merely, though the world

Be loudest in their praise who do no more.

Yet what can satire, whether grave or gay?

It may correct a foible, may chastise

The freaks of fashion, regulate the dress,

Retrench a sword-blade, or displace a patch;

But where are its sublimer trophies found?

What vice has it subdued? whose heart reclaimed

By rigour, or whom laughed into reform?

Alas, Leviathan is not so tamed.

Laughed at, he laughs again; and, stricken hard,

Turns to the stroke his adamantine scales,

That fear no discipline of human hands.

The pulpit therefore—and I name it, filled

With solemn awe, that bids me well beware

With what intent I touch that holy thing—

The pulpit, when the satirist has at last,

Strutting and vapouring in an empty school,

Spent all his force, and made no proselyte—

I say the pulpit, in the sober use

Of its legitimate peculiar powers,

Must stand acknowledged, while the world shall stand,

The most important and effectual guard,

Support, and ornament of virtue’s cause.

There stands the messenger of truth; there stands

The legate of the skies; his theme divine,

His office sacred, his credentials clear.

By him, the violated Law speaks out

Its thunders, and by him, in strains as sweet

As angels use, the Gospel whispers peace.

He stablishes the strong, restores the weak,

Reclaims the wanderer, binds the broken heart,

And, armed himself in panoply complete

Of heavenly temper, furnishes with arms

Bright as his own, and trains, by every rule

Of holy discipline, to glorious war,

The sacramental host of God’s elect.

Are all such teachers? would to heaven all were!

But hark—the Doctor’s voice—fast wedged between

Two empirics he stands, and with swollen cheeks

Inspires the news, his trumpet. Keener far

Than all invective is his bold harangue,

While through that public organ of report

He hails the clergy, and, defying shame,

Announces to the world his own and theirs,

He teaches those to read whom schools dismissed,

And colleges, untaught; sells accents, tone,

And emphasis in score, and gives to prayer

The adagio and andante it demands.

He grinds divinity of other days

Down into modern use; transforms old print

To zigzag manuscript, and cheats the eyes

Of gallery critics by a thousand arts.—

Are there who purchase of the Doctor’s ware?

Oh name it not in Gath!—it cannot be,

That grave and learned Clerks should need such aid.

He doubtless is in sport, and does but droll,

Assuming thus a rank unknown before,

Grand caterer and dry-nurse of the Church.

I venerate the man whose heart is warm,

Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life,

Coincident, exhibit lucid proof

That he is honest in the sacred cause.

To such I render more than mere respect,

Whose actions say that they respect themselves.

But, loose in morals, and in manners vain,

In conversation frivolous, in dress

Extreme, at once rapacious and profuse,

Frequent in park with lady at his side,

Ambling and prattling scandal as he goes,

But rare at home, and never at his books

Or with his pen, save when he scrawls a card;

Constant at routs, familiar with a round

Of ladyships, a stranger to the poor;

Ambitions of preferment for its gold,

And well prepared by ignorance and sloth,

By infidelity and love o’ the world,

To make God’s work a sinecure; a slave

To his own pleasures and his patron’s pride.—

From such apostles, O ye mitred heads,

Preserve the Church! and lay not careless hands

On skulls that cannot teach, and will not learn.

Would I describe a preacher, such as Paul,

Were he on earth, would hear, approve, and own,

Paul should himself direct me. I would trace

His master-strokes, and draw from his design.

I would express him simple, grave, sincere;

In doctrine uncorrupt; in language plain,

And plain in manner; decent, solemn, chaste,

And natural in gesture; much impressed

Himself, as conscious of his awful charge,

And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds

May feel it too; affectionate in look

And tender in address, as well becomes

A messenger of grace to guilty men.

Behold the picture!—Is it like?—Like whom?

The things that mount the rostrum with a skip,

And then skip down again; pronounce a text,

Cry—Hem; and reading what they never wrote,

Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work,

And with a well-bred whisper close the scene.

In man or woman, but far most in man,

And most of all in man that mini............