Behold the schools, in which plebeian minds
Once simple are initiated in arts,
Which some may practice with politer grace,
But none with readier skill. '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 incumber'd lap, and casts them out.
But censure profits little: vain th' 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.
Th' 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 th' important call!
Her cause demands the assistance of your throats;
Ye all can swallow, and she asks no more.
Task, book iv.
We add a few short passages:
How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude!
But grant me still a friend in my retreat
Whom I may whisper—solitude is sweet.
Not to understand a treasure's worth
Till time has stolen away the slighted good
Is cause of half the poverty we feel,
And makes the world the wilderness it is.
Not a year but pilfers as he goes
Some youthful grace, that age would gladly keep.
When one that holds communion with the skies
Has fill'd his urn where these pure waters rise,
And once more mingles with us meaner things,
'Tis even as if an angel shook his wings;
Immortal fragrance fills the circuit wide,
That tells us whence his treasures are supplied.
We must not omit a most splendid specimen of Cowper's poetic genius, entitled the "Yardley Oak." It is an unfinished poem, and supposed to have been written in the year 1791, and laid aside, without ever having been resumed, when his attention was engrossed with the edition of Milton. Whatever may be the history of this admirable fragment, it has justly acquired for Cowper the reputation of having produced one of the richest and most highly finished pieces of versification that ever flowed from the pen of a poet. Its existence even was unknown both to Dr. Johnson and Hayley, till the latter discovered it buried in a mass of papers. We subjoin in a note a letter addressed by Dr. Johnson to Hayley, containing further particulars.[781]
Though this fragment is inserted among the poems, we extract the following passages, as expressive of the vigour and inspiration of true poetic genius.
Thou wast a bauble once, a cup and ball,
Which babes might play with; and the thievish jay,
Seeking her food, with ease might have purloin'd
The auburn nut that held thee, swallowing down
Thy yet close-folded latitude of boughs,
And all thine embryo vastness at a gulp.
But Fate thy growth decreed; autumnal rains
Beneath thy parent tree mellow'd the soil,
Design'd thy cradle; and a skipping deer,
With pointed hoof dibbling the glebe, prepar'd
The soft receptacle, in which, secure,
Thy rudiments should sleep the winter through.
So Fancy dreams.