O THOU, the Friend of Man assign'd,
With balmy Hands his Wounds to bind,
And charm his frantic Woe:
When first Distress with Dagger keen
Broke forth to waste his destin'd Scene,
His wild unsated Foe!
By Pella's *Bard, a magic Name,
By all the Griefs his Thought could frame,
Receive my humble Rite:
Long, Pity, let the Nations view
Thy sky-worn Robes of tend'rest Blue,
And Eyes of dewy Light!
But wherefore need I wander wide
To old Ilissus' distant Side,
Deserted Stream, and mute?
Wild Arun too has heard thy Strains,
And Echo, 'midst my native Plains,
Been sooth'd by Pity's Lute.
There first the Wren thy Myrtles shed
On gentlest Otway's infant Head,
To Him thy Cell was shown;
*Euripides, of whom Aristotle pronounces, on a Comparison of him with Sophocles, That he was the greater Master of the tender Passions, ἦν τραγικώτερος.
+ The River Arun runs by the Village in Sussex, where Otway had his Birth.
And while He sung the Female Heart, With Youth's soft Notes unspoil'd by Art, Thy Turtles mix'd their own.
Come, Pity, come, by Fancy's Aid,
Ev'n now my Thoughts, relenting Maid,
Thy Temple's Pride design:
Its Southern Site, its Truth compleat
Shall raise a wild Enthusiast Heat,
In all who view the Shrine.
There Picture's Toils shall well relate,
How Chance, or hard involving Fate,
O'er mortal Bliss prevail:
The Buskin'd Muse shall near her stand,
And sighing prompt her tender Hand,
With each disastrous Tale.
There let me oft, retir'd by Day,
In Dreams of Passion melt away,
Allow'd with Thee to dwell:
There waste the mournful Lamp of Night,
Till, Virgin, Thou again delight
To hear a British Shell!
THOU, to whom the World unknown
With all its shadowy Shapes is shown:
Who see'st appall'd th' unreal Scene,
While Fancy lifts the Veil between:
Ah Fear! Ah frantic Fear!
I see, I see Thee near.
I know thy hurried Step, thy haggard Eye!
Like Thee I start, like Thee disorder'd flv.
For lo what Monsters in thy Train appear!
Danger, whose Limbs of Giant Mold
What mortal Eye can fix'd behold?
Who stalks his Round, an hideous Form,
Howling amidst the Midnight Storm,
Or throws him on the ridgy Steep
Of some loose hanging Rock to sleep:
And with him thousand Phantoms join'd,
Who prompt to Deeds accurs'd the Mind:
And those, the Fiends, who near allied,
O'er Nature's Wounds, and Wrecks preside;
Whilst Vengeance, in the lurid Air,
Lifts her red Arm, expos'd and bare:
On whom that rav'ning Brood of Fate,
Who lap the Blood of Sorrow, wait:
Who, Fear, this ghastly Train can see,
And look not madly wild, like Thee?
* Alluding to the Kúvas åpúkтous of Sophocles. See the ELECTRA.
In earliest Grece to Thee with partial Choice,
The Grief-full Muse addrest her infant Tongue;
The Maids and Matrons, on her awful Voice,
Silent and pale in wild Amazement hung.
Yet He, the Bard* who first invok'd thy Name,
Disdain'd in Marathon its Pow'r to feel:
For not alone he nurs'd the Poet's flame,
But reach'd from Virtue's Hand the Patriot's Steel.
But who is He whom later Garlands grace,
Who left a-while o'er Hybla's Dews to rove,
With trembling Eyes thy dreary Steps to trace,
Where Thou and Furies shar'd the baleful Grove?
Wrapt in thy cloudy Veil, the Incestuous Queen †
Sigh'd the sad Call ‡ her Son and Husband hear'd,
When once alone it broke the silent Scene,
And He the Wretch of Thebes no more appear'd.
O Fear, I know Thee by my throbbing Heart,
Thy with'ring Pow'r inspir'd each mournful Line,
Tho' gentle Pity claim her mingled Part,
Yet all the Thunders of the Scene are thine!
Thou who such weary Lengths hast past,
Where wilt thou rest, mad Nymph, at last?
Say, wilt thou shroud in haunted Cell,
Where gloomy Rape and Murder dwell?
+ Jocasta.
οὐδ ̓ ἔτ ̓ ὠρώρει βοή,
Ἦν μὲν σιωπή φθέγμα δ ̓ ἐξαίφνης τινὸς
Θώϋξεν αὐτόν, ὥστε πάντας ὀρθίας
Στῆσαι φόβῳ δείσαντας ἐξαίφνης τρίχας.
See the dip. Colon. of Sophocles.
Or, in some hollow'd Seat,
'Gainst which the big Waves beat,
Hear drowning Sea-men's Cries in Tempests brought! Dark Pow'r, with shudd'ring meek submitted Thought
Be mine, to read the Visions old,
Which thy awak'ning Bards have told:
And lest thou meet my blasted View,
Hold each strange Tale devoutly true;
Ne'er be I found, by Thee o'eraw'd,
In that thrice-hallow'd Eve abroad,
When Ghosts, as Cottage-Maids believe,
Their pebbled Beds permitted leave,
And Gobblins haunt from Fire, or Fen,
Or Mine, or Flood, the Walks of Men!
O Thou whose Spirit most possest
The sacred Seat of Shakespear's Breast!
By all that from thy Prophet broke,
In thy Divine Emotions spoke;
Hither again thy Fury deal,
Teach me but once like Him to feel:
His Cypress Wreath my Meed decree,
And I, O Fear, will dwell with Thee!
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