The poet of ‘The Task’ spoke of ‘cups;’ and, it is very evident, from the graphic description of the accompanying urn, that those cups were intended to hold a certain beverage that had been introduced into England about 130 years before ‘The Task’ was written, and which, by those who could afford to purchase it at the high price then demanded for it, was known as ‘Tea.’ It might be urged, with more ingenuity than plausibility, that, as Cowper does not mention the contents of the cups, they, together with the hot water in the loud-hissing urn, might have been used for some of those compounds, familiarly known as ‘Cups.’ Thus, there were ‘cups’ of spiced wine, Claret, Burgundy, Gilliflower sack, Hydromel (which was recommended by Lord Holles to those who abjured wine, and was composed of honey, spring-water, and ginger), Cider, and many kinds of ale and Beer-cups, distinguished by such extraordinary names as Humpty-dumpty, Clamber-clown, Old Pharaoh, Hugmatee, Stitchback, Cock-ale, Three-threads, Mum, and Knock-me-down, which last name is particularly suggestive of the probable result of the toper’s indulgence in a brew of hot ale-cup, in which gin was a leading ingredient.
It is very evident that it could only be a person who was very hard-up for an argument, who could think of framing such an accusation against the abstemious and gentle William Cowper, and who could interpret his ‘cups’ in any other sense than as cups for tea. In fact, the whole passage presents to us a tea-table scene; and, as we read it, we can see the comfortable parlour at Olney, the curtains closely drawn—in that respect very sensibly differing from
‘The half-uncurtain’d window,’
mentioned in the winter-evening’s scene, in Campbell’s ‘Pleasures of Hope’—with the bubbling urn, containing, possibly, the tea already made, or else ready to contribute its boiling stream to the tea-pot.
But this sort of evening was not the usual evening in England in 1785. Much more frequently was the evening spent in what our poet himself calls ‘the quenchless thirst of ruinous ebriety,’ and describes in the following lines (Task, lib. iv.):—
Pass where we may, through city or through town,
Village or hamlet of this merry land,
Though lean and beggar’d, every twentieth pace
Conducts the unguarded nose to such a whiff
Of stale debauch, forth issuing from the styes
That Law has licensed, as makes Temperance reel.
There sit, involved and lost in curling clouds
Of Indian fume, and guzzling deep, the boor,
The lackey, and the groom: the craftsman there
Takes a Lethean leave of all his toil;
Smith, cobbler, joiner, he that plies the shears,
And he that kneads the dough; all aloud alike,
All learned, and all drunk! the fiddle screams
Plaintive and piteous, as it wept and wail’d
Its wasted tones and harmony unheard.
* * * *
‘Tis here they learn
The road that leads from competence and peace
To indigence and rapine; till at last
Society, grown weary of the load,
Shakes her encumber’d lap, and casts them out.
But censure profits little: vain the attempt
To advertise in verse a public pest
That, like the filth with which the peasant feeds
His hungry acres, stinks and is of use.
The excise is fatten’d with the rich result
Of all this riot: and ten thousand casks
For ever dribbling out their base contents,
Touch’d by the Midas finger of the State,
Bleed gold for ministers to sport away.
Drink and be mad then; ‘tis your country bids!
Gloriously drunk obey the important call!
Her cause demands the assistance of your throats
Ye all can swallow, and she asks no more.
Towards the end of the progress of error is the sage advice:—
With caution taste the sweet Circæan cup;
He that sips often at last drinks it up.
Habits are soon assumed, but when we strive
To strip them off ‘tis being flayed alive.
Call’d to the temple of impure delight
He that abstains, and he alone, does right.
Finally, an admirable moral is contained in the lines:—
Pleasure admitted in undue degree
Enslaves the will, nor leaves the judgment free.
‘Tis not alone the grape’s enticing juice
Unnerves the moral powers, and mars their use;
Ambition, avarice, and the lust of fame,
And woman, lovely woman, does the same.