The subject proposed. Invocation. Address to Mr. Dodington. An introductory reflection on the motion of the heavenly bodies; whence the succession of the seasons. As the face of Nature in this season is almost uniform, the progress of the poem is a description of a summer's day. The dawn. Sun-rising. Hymn to the sun. Forenoon. Summer insects described. Haymaking. Sheepshearing. Noonday. A woodland retreat. Group of herds and flocks. A solemn grove: how it affects a contemplative mind. A cataract, and rude scene. View of Summer in the torrid zone. Storm of thunder and lightning. A tale. The storm over, a sorene afternoon. Bathing. Hour of walking. Transition to the prospect of a rich well cultivated country; which introduces a panegyric on Great Britain. Sun-set. Evening. Night. Summer meteors. A comet. The whole concluding with the praise of philosophy.
FROM brightening fields of ether fair disclosed, Child of the Sun, refulgent SUMMER comes, In pride of youth, and felt through Nature's depth. He comes attended by the sultry Hours, And ever fanning breezes, on his way; While, from his ardent look, the turning Spring Averts her blushful face; and earth, and skies, All smiling, to his hot dominion leaves.
Hence, let me haste into the midwood shade,
Where scarce a sunbeam wanders through the gloom; And on the dark-green grass, beside the brink Of haunted stream, that by the roots of oak
Rolls o'er the rocky channel, lie at large, And sing the glories of the circling year.
Come, Inspiration! from thy hermit-seat,
By mortal seldom found: may Fancy dare, From thy fix'd serious eye, and raptured glance Shot on surrounding heaven, to steal one look Creative of the Poet, every power Exalting to an ecstasy of soul.
And thou, my youthful Muse's early friend, In whom the human graces all unite : Pure light of mind, and tenderness of heart: Genius, and wisdom; the gay social sense, By decency chastised; goodness and wit, In seldom-meeting harmony combined; Unblemish'd honour, and an active zeal For Britain's glory, Liberty, and Man; O Dodington! attend my rural song, Stoop to my theme, inspirit every line, And teach me to deserve thy just applause.
With what an awful world-revolving power
Were first the unwieldly planets launch'd along The' illimitable void! thus to remain,
Amid the flux of many thousand years,
That oft has swept the toiling race of men And all their labour'd monuments away, Firm, unremitting, matchless, in their course;
To the kind-temper'd change of night and day, And of the seasons ever stealing round, Minutely faithful: such the' All-perfect Hand! That poised, impels, and rules the steady whole. When now no more the' alternate Twins are fired, And Cancer reddens with the solar blaze, Short is the doubtful empire of the night; And soon, observant of approaching day, The meek-eyed Morn appears, mother of dews, At first faint-gleaming in the dappled cast: Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glow; And, from before the lustre of her face,
White break the clouds away. With quicken'd step, Brown Night retires: young Day pours in apace, And opens all the lawny prospect wide.
The dripping rock, the mountain's misty top
Swell on the sight, and brighten with the dawn.
Blue, through the dusk, the smoking currents shine; And from the bladed field the fearful hare
Limps, awkward; while along the forest glade
The wild deer trip, and often turning gaze At early passenger. Music awakes
The native voice of undissembled joy; And thick around the woodland hymns arise. Roused by the cock, the soon-clad shepherd leaves His mossy cottage, where with Peace he dwells; And from the crowded fold, in order, drives His flock, to taste the verdure of the morn. Falsely luxurious! will not Man awake; And, springing from the bed of sloth, enjoy The cool, the fragrant, and the silent hour, To meditation due and sacred song?
For is there ought in sleep can charm the wise?
To lie in dead oblivion, losing half
The fleeting moments of too short a life;
Total extinction of the' enlighten'd soul!
Or else, to feverish vanity alive,
Wilder'd, and tossing through distemper'd dreams? Who would in such a gloomy state remain Longer than Nature craves; when every Muse And every blooming pleasure wait without, To bless the wildly devious morning walk?
But yonder comes the powerful King of Day, Rejoicing in the east. The lessening cloud, The kindling azure, and the mountain's brow Illumed with fluid gold, his near approach Betoken glad. Lo! now, apparent all, Aslant the dew-bright earth, and colour'd air, He looks in boundless majesty abroad;
And sheds the shining day, that burnish'd plays
On rocks and hills and towers and wandering streams, High gleaming from afar. Prime cheerer, Light! 90 Of all material beings first and best!
Efflux divine! Nature's resplendent robe! Without whose vesting beauty all were wrapp'd In unessential gloom! and thou, O Sun!
Soul of surrounding worlds' in whom best seen Shines out thy Maker! may I sing of thee?
'Tis by thy secret, strong, attractive force, As with a chain indissoluble bound, Thy system rolls entire: from the far bourn Of utmost Saturn, wheeling wide his round Of thirty years, to Mercury, whose disk Can scarce be caught by philosophic eye, Lost in the near effulgence of thy blaze. Informer of the planetary train!
Without whose quickening glance their cumbrous orbs
Were brute unlovely mass, inert and dead,
And not, as now, the green abodes of life! How many forms of being wait on thee! Inhaling spirit; from the' unfetter'd mind, By thee sublimed, down to the daily race, The mixing myriads of thy setting beam. The vegetable world is also thine, Parent of Seasons! who the pomp precede That waits thy throne, as through thy vast domain, Annual, along the bright ecliptic road,
In world-rejoicing state, it moves sublime. Meantime the' expecting nations, circled gay With all the various tribes of foodful earth, Implore thy bounty, or send grateful up
A common hymn: while, round thy beaming car, 120 High seen, the Seasons lead, in sprightly dance Harmonious knit, the rosy-finger'd Hours,
The Zephyrs floating loose, the timely Rains, Of bloom ethereal the light footed Dews, And soften'd into joy the surly Storms. These, in successive turn, with lavish hand, Shower every beauty, every fragrance shower,
Herbs, flowers, and fruits; and, kindling at thy touch, From land to land is flush'd the vernal year. Nor to the surface of enliven'd earth, Graceful with hills and dales, and leafy woods, Her liberal tresses, is thy force confined: But, to the bowel'd cavern darting deep,
The mineral kinds confess thy mighty power
Effulgent, hence the veiny marble shines;
Hence Labour draws his tools; hence burnish'd War Gleams on the day! the nobler works of Peace
Hence bless mankind, and generous Commerce binds The round of nations in a golden chain.
The' unfruitful rock itself, impregn'd by thee, 140 In dark retirement forms the lucid stone.
The lively diamond drinks thy purest rays, Collected light, compact; that, polish'd bright, And all its native lustre let abroad,
Dares, as it sparkles on the fair one's breast, With vain ambition emulate her eyes. At thee the ruby lights its deepening glow, And with a waving radiance inward flames. From thee the sapphire, solid ether, takes Its hue cerulean; and, of evening tinct, The purple-streaming amethyst is thine. With thy own smile the yellow topaz burns. Nor deeper verdure dyes the robe of Spring, When first she gives it to the southern gale,
Than the green emerald shows. But, all combined,
Thick through the whitening opal play thy beams; Or, flying several from its surface, form A trembling variance of revolving hues, As the site varies in the gazer's hand.
The very dead creation, from thy touch, Assumes a mimic life. By thee refined, In brighter mazes the relucent stream Plays o'er the mead. The precipice abrupt, Projecting horror on the blacken'd flood, Softens at thy return. The desert joys, Wildly, through all his melancholy bounds. Rude ruins glitter; and the briny deep, Seen from some pointed promontory's top, Far to the blue horizon's utmost verge, Restless, reflects a floating gleam. But this, And all the much transported Muse can sing,
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