-Material forms-had not in truth the coloursNor essences thou wouldst have cloath'd them with;— But ne'ertheless they would not have been fram'd By fiction false; but did in truth exist
To thy creative eye and flowing heart.
The sun shone o'er the waves with brighter beams Than on the mingled mass of land : and more Of freshness as they beat and spray'd and sparkled, And worked themselves to purity by collision, Won on the senses, and evok'd the tribes Of Fairy habitants within the cells
Of brain and bosom. O who had sagacity In this thy childhood, looking on thy face And delicate features, and thy slender frame, To presage ought above the common gifts Of vulgar children? On the rocky stone, The fickle billows dash'd, thy limbs were laid : And then with ear intent thou didst drink in The sounds, that on the wave came whispering down, Or sometimes shrieking. Airy spirits danc'd, Or slid along the surface of the blue,
And green and white all mingled, of the waves; Or rose amid the glittering spray, and laugh'd And mock'd, and breath'd out magic syllables, And half display'd their limbs of exquisite And most etherial beauty, when thy boyhood, O'erdazzled, veil'd thine eyes, and in thyself Absorb'd and lost, sunk utterly regardless Of all without. Sometimes in search of thee, They, from whose care thine errant feet escap'd,
Found thee still sleeping as th'advancing flood Gain'd on thy stony bed; and thou wouldst cry And fret and storm to be thus rudely wak'd Midst of thy golden slumbers! And thy nurse Would rate thee as a moody, cross-grain'd child, Of whom no good would come! and in disdain Thy little eye would fire, and thou wouldst stamp, And deal about thy puny blows, and rave With thy impetuous and half-stifled voice! And even then thou felt'dst the day would come When thou, the infant treated with despite And scorn for thy defaults, wouldst craze the world With beams of splendor, that the sober sense Of all, deem'd happier-gifted, would in vain Strive to repell or to endure!-'Tis thus That Genius ever feels: and thus it swells Against the vain and blind oppressor: thus It knows how folly, dulness, ignorance, Ever miscalculate; and dim presumption Thinks in the infant of stale common-place
A prize to be well-hugg'd, and prais'd and flatter'd. How much hadst thou, Enchanter, in thy days Of boyhood, to oppress, disturb, and cross The opening of thy mind, to interrupt The laying-in of wisdom, and to mix Foulness and poison in the issuing streams Of tender, pure, and magic-mellow'd sentiment! But there was in its essence a bright spell, That threw off all th'impurities with scorn And might, and indignation, and untouch'd
Stood in surrounding pools of dirt and vapour! A seer perchance might clearly have discern'd The rays that play'd around thee; but the veil Hung thick before the vulgar earthly sight: A trade mechanic could not dark the lamp That blaz'd within thee, and thy hands consign'd To labour for thy head; and fear of want, And despot brutal orders of a despot Master, unjust, capricious, ignorant, And unillum'd by casual gleams of mind. When the tir'd body has its organs press'd By the deranged current of the blood, How ill the mental faculties can work, Unless some blest supremacy of power
O'ercomes the direful load! But the all-mounting Fire of true genius will pierce through, and rise, Spite of clouds, storms, and vapours, up to Heaven! It was not in society that thou
Caught'dst the refinement of thy bosom's motions; For much of coarse was there: nor in the ranks Where wealth and education smoothe the manners, And elevate the thoughts, and purify
The views, wert thou accustomed to have Thine infant ear delighted, or thy bosom Touch'd with the sweetness of habitual rule Of intellectual dominion!
The eye of female beauty, elevated
By birth, and in the school of Riches, form'd By wisdom's lessons, and the softening stores Of delicate and high imagination,
Ne'er beam'd on thee the melting magic of
Its irresistible irradiation:
But all the glory, and the golden tints, Sky-borrow'd, came from thee, and on the object Of its deep idol-worship threw the blaze, Kneeling to deities of its own creation. But such is ever bright Imagination's Delusion dangerous! Shall we attribute Aught to thy clime, thy mountains, the expanse Of this thine azure mirror, by whose loveliness The splendor, and the beauty, and the rays Of beamy lustre, breaking but by fits Thro mountainous vapours, and sometimes a chill Of snow-clad summits, bosom'd in thick clouds Of Heaven, may have been on that breast of sun And tempests, then again in massy darkness Impress'd! O no! 'tis not to earthly causes That we must look : but 'tis the gift of heaven,— This high creative splendor, that within Works, and its forms and colours outward throws: But yet, though lakes and mountains and the sway Of nature's scenery in its most sublime
And awe-engendering shapes and tints, cannot Originate th'internal faculty,
Still it may nurse and fan and bring it forth;
For in the heavy vapour of dull skies,
And flat and fen-like countries, much I doubt, If genius ever can mount high, or duly
Along th'oerhanging skies
Comes sweeping o'er the Lake the loud career Of tempests, bred the gorges deep among Of those enormous Alpine masses, clad In snow eternal, down whose craggy sides The roaring torrents fall, and intermix Their spray, that into ice-bound atoms turn'd, Add arrows to the loud careering stream,
And sweep the gather'd pestilences bred
I' th'air, and thro those clouds which o'er thy walls, Geneva, as o'er all th'abodes of man
In congregated heaps, brood harmfully Passing-an healthful, airy, free, and sharp Atmosphere give it! O, how in the roar Of winter nights 'tis terrible;-but grand ;- And braces up the spirits to delight.
O then the' inhabitants of the vex'd sky In battle seem; and what a shrill loud shriek Does ever and anon the blast bring on
To the astonish'd ear! Not three fleet months Have pass'd away, since thro the long black night I listen'd to this music of the spheres ! For right against the torrent was th'abode Where on my bed of sickness I, awake,
Told the long hours, and watching by the blaze Of cheerful lamp, my magic leaves unfolded, And wove my tales, and urg'd my weary pen! How oft I gan imagine that I could The language of the Winds interpret well : And tell the gusts of Anger from the shrieks Of sorrow;-and the murmur soft, between,
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