Bear witness. There, oft let the farmer hail
The sacred orchard which imbowers his gate,
And show to strangers passing down the vale,
Where Ca'ndish, Booth, and Osborne sate;
When, bursting from their country's chain,
Even in the midst of deadly arms,
Of papal snares and lawless arms,
come, the ancient founder of the stage,
Intent to learn, in this discerning age,
What form of wit your fancies have embrac'd,
And whither tends your elegance of taste,
That thus at length our homely toils you spurn,
That thus to foreign scenes you proudly turn,
That from my brow the laurel wreath you claim
They plann'd for Freedom this her noblest reign. To crown the rivals of your country's fame.
This reign, these laws, this public care,
Which Nassau gave us all to share,
Had ne'er adorn'd the English name,
Could Fear have silenc'd Freedom's claim.
But Fear in vain attempts to bind
Those lofty efforts of the mind
Which social Good inspires;
Where men, for this, assault a throne,
Each adds the common welfare to his own;
And each unconquer'd heart the strength of all ac-
quires.
Say, was it thus, when late we view'd 'Our fields in civil blood imbrued?
When Fortune crown'd the barbarous host,
And half the astonish'd isle was lost?
Did one of all that vaunting train,
Who dare affront a peaceful reign,
Durst one in arms appear?
Durst one in counsels pledge his life?
Stake his luxurious fortunes in the strife?
Or lend his boasted name his vagrant friends to cheer?
Yet, Hastings, these are they
Who challenge to themselves thy country's love;
The true; the constant: who alone can weigh,
What Glory should demand, or Liberty approve!
But let their works declare them. Thy free powers,
The generous powers of thy prevailing mind,
Not for the tasks of their confederate hours,
Lewd brawls and lurking slander, where design'd.
Honest praise
Be thou thy own approver.
Oft nobly sways
Ingenuous youth:
But, sought from cowards and the lying mouth,
Praise is reproach. Eternal God alone
For mortals fixeth that sublime award.
He, from the faithful records of his throne,
Bids the historian and the bard
Dispose of honour and of scorn;
Discern the patriot from the slave;
And write the good, the wise, the brave,
For lessons to the multitude unborn.
THE REMONSTRANCE OF SHAKSPEARE:
SUPPOSED TO HAVE BEEN SPOKEN AT the theatre-ROYAL,
WHILE THE FRENCH COMEDIANS WERE ACTING BY SUB-
SCRIPTION.
IF, yet regardful of your native land,
Old Shakspeare's tongue you deign to understand,
Lo! from the blissful bowers where Heaven rewards
Instructive sages and unblemish'd bards,
What, though the footsteps of my devious Muse
The measur'd walks of Grecian art refuse?
Or though the frankness of my hardy style
Mock the nice touches of the critic's file?
Yet, what my age and climate held to view,
Impartial I survey'd and fearless drew.
And say, ye skilful in the human heart,
Who know to prize a poet's noblest part,
What age, what clime, could e'er an ampler field
For lofty thought, for daring fancy, yield?
I saw this England break the shameful bands
Forg'd for the souls of men by sacred hands:
I saw each groaning realm her aid implore;
Her sons the heroes of each warlike shore:
Her naval standard (the dire Spaniard's bane)
Obey'd through all the circuit of the main.
Then too great Commerce, for a late-found world,
Around your coast her eager sails unfurl'd:
New hopes, new passions, thence the bosom fir'd;
New plans, new arts, the genius thence inspir'd ;
Thence every scene, which private fortune knows,
In stronger life, with bolder spirit, rose.
Disgrac'd I this full prospect which I drew?
My colours languid, or my strokes untrue?
Have not your sages, warriors, swains, and kings,
Confess'd the living draught of men and things?
What other bard in any clime appears
Alike the master of your smiles and tears?
Yet have I deign'd your audience to entice
With wretched bribes to Luxury and Vice?
Or have my various scenes a purpose known
Which Freedom, Virtue, Glory, might not own?
Such from the first was my dramatic plan:
It should be yours to crown what I began:
And now that England spurns her Gothic chain,
And equal laws and social science reign,
I thought, Now surely shall my zealous eyes
View nobler bards and juster critics rise,
Intent with learned labour to refine
The copious ore of Albion's native mine,
Our stately Muse more graceful airs to teach,
And form her tongue to more attractive speech,
Till rival nations listen at her feet,
And own her polish'd, as they own'd her great.
But do you thus my favourite hopes fulfil?
Is France at last the standard of your skill?
Alas for you! that so betray a mind
Of art unconscious, and to beauty blind.
Say; does her language your ambition raise,
Her barren, trivial, unharmonious phrase,
Which fetters eloquence to scantiest bounds,
And maims the cadence of poetic sounds?
Say; does your humble admiration choose
The gentle prattle of her comic Muse,
While wits, plain-dealers, fops, and fools appear,
Charg'd to say nought but what the king may hear?
Or rather melt your sympathizing hearts,
Won by her tragic scene's romantic arts,
Where old and young declaim on soft desire,
And heroes never, but for love, expire?
No. Though the charms of novelty, a while,
Perhaps too fondly win your thoughtless smile,
Yet not for you design'd indulgent Fate
The modes or manners of the Bourbon state.
And ill your minds my partial judgment reads,
And many an augury my hope misleads,
If the fair maids of yonder blooming train
To their light courtship would an audience deign,
Or those chaste matrons a Parisian wife
Choose for the model of domestic life;
Or if one youth of all that generous band,
The strength and splendour of their native land,
Would yield his portion of his country's fame,
And quit old Freedom's patrimonial claim,
With lying smiles Oppression's pomp to see,
And judge of glory by a king's decree.
O blest at home with justly-envied laws,
O long the chiefs of Europe's general cause,
Whom Heaven hath chosen at each dangerous hour
To check the inroads of barbaric power,
The rights of trampled nations to reclaim,
And guard the social world from bonds and shame;
Oh! let not Luxury's fantastic charms
Thus give the lie to your heroic arms:
Nor for the ornaments of life embrace
Dishonest lessons from that vaunting race,
Whom Fate's dread laws (for, in eternal Fate,
Despotic Rule was heir to Freedom's hate)
Whom, in each warlike, each commercial part,
In civil counsel, and in pleasing art,
The judge of Earth predestin'd for your foes,
And made it fame and virtue to oppose.
Nor yet those awful forms present, For chiefs and heroes only meant: The figur'd brass, the choral 'song, The rescued people's glad applause, The listening senate, and the laws Fix'd by the counsels of Timoleon's tongue, Are scenes too grand for Fortune's private ways; And though they shine in youth's ingenuous view, The sober gainful arts of modern days
To such romantic thoughts have bid a long adieu.
I ask not, god of dreams, thy care To banish Love's presentments fair: Nor rosy cheek, nor radiant eye Can arm him with such strong command That the young sorcerer's fatal hand Shall round my soul his pleasing fetters tie. Nor yet the courtier's hope, the giving smile (A lighter phantom, and a baser chain) Did e'er in slumber my proud lyre beguile To lend the pomp of thrones her ill-according strain.
But, Morpheus, on thy balmy wing Such honourable visions bring, As sooth'd great Milton's injur'd age, When in prophetic dreams he saw The race unborn with pious awe Imbibe each virtue from his heavenly page: Or such as Mead's benignant fancy knows When Health's deep treasures, by his art explor'd, Have sav'd the infant from an orphan's woes, Or to the trembling sire his age's hope restor'd.
Taou silent power, whose welcome sway Charms every anxious thought away; In whose divine oblivion drown'd, Sore pain and weary toil grow mild, Love is with kinder looks beguil'd, And Grief forgets her fondly-cherish'd wound; O whither hast thou flown, indulgent god? God of kind shadows and of healing dews, Whom dost thou touch with thy Lethæan rod? Around whose temples now thy opiate airs diffuse?
Lo! Midnight from her starry reign
Looks awful down on earth and main.
The tuneful birds lie hush'd in sleep,
With all that crop the verdant food,
With all that skim the crystal flood,
Or haunt the caverns of the rocky steep.
No rushing winds disturb the tufted bowers;
No wakeful sound the moon-light valley knows,
Save where the brook its liquid murmur pours,
And lulls the waving scene to more profound repose.
O let not me alone complain,
Alone invoke thy power in vain!
Descend, propitious, on my eyes;
Not from the couch that bears a crown,
Not from the courtly statesman's down,
Nor where the miser and his treasure lies:
Bring not the shapes that break the murderer's rest,
Nor those the hireling soldier loves to see,
Nor those which haunt the bigot's gloomy breast:
Far be their guilty nights, and far their dreams
from me!
O RUSTIC herald of the Spring,
At length in yonder woody vale
Fast by the brook I hear thee sing;
And, studious of thy homely tale,
Amid the vespers of the grove,
Amid the chaunting choir of love,
Thy sage responses hail.
The time has been when I have frown'd
To hear thy voice the woods invade;
And while thy solemn accent drown'd
Some sweeter poet of the shade,
"Thus," thought I, "thus the sons of Care
Some constant youth, or generous fair,
With dull advice upbraid."
I said, "While Philomela's song
Proclaims the passion of the grove,
It ill beseems a cuckoo's tongue
Her charming language to reprove"-
Alas! how much a lover's ear
Hates all the sober truth to hear,
The sober truth of Love!
1 After Timoleon had delivered Syracuse from the tyranny of Dionysius, the people on every important deliberation sent for him into the public assembly, asked his advice, and voted according to it. Plutarch.
Nor to the embattled field
Shall the achievements of the peaceful gown
The green immortal crown
Of valour, or the songs of conquest yield.
Not Fairfax wildly bold,
While bare of crest he hew'd his fatal way,
Through Naseby's firm array,
To heavier dangers did his breast oppose
Than Pym's free virtue chose,
When the proud force of Strafford he control'd.
But what is man at enmity with truth?
What were the fruits of Wentworth's copious
mind,
When (blighted all the promise of his youth)
The patriot in a tyrant's league had join'd?
Let Ireland's loud-lamenting plains,
Let Tyne's and Humber's trampled swains,
Let menac'd London tell
How impious Guile made Wisdom base; How generous Zeal to cruel Rage gave place; And how unbless'd he liv'd, and how dishonour'd fell.
He knew, the patriot knew, That letters and the Muses' powerful art Exalt the ingenuous heart,
And brighten every form of just and true.
They lend a nobler sway
To civil Wisdom, than Corruption's lure
Could ever yet procure:
They too from Envy's pale malignant light
Conduct her forth to sight,
Cloth'd in the fairest colours of the day.
O Townshend, thus may Time, the judge severe,
Instruct my happy tongue of thee to tell :
And when I speak of one to Freedom dear
For planning wisely and for acting well,
Of one whom Glory loves to own,
Who still by liberal means alone
Hath liberal ends pursued;
Then, for the guerdon of my lay,
"This man with faithful friendship," will I say, "From youth to honour'd age my arts and me hath view'd."
Yet, Hall, while thy judicious ear
Admires the well-dissembled art
That can such harmony impart
To the lame pace of Gallic rhymes;
While wit from affectation clear,
Bright images, and passions true,
Recall to thy assenting view
The envied bards of nobler times;
Say, is not oft his doctrine wrong?
This priest of Pleasure, who aspires
To lead us to her sacred fires,
Knows he the ritual of her shrine?
Say (her sweet influence to thy song
So may the goddess still afford)
Doth she consent to be ador'd
With shameless love and frantic wine?
Nor Cato, nor Chrysippus here
Need we in high indignant phrase
From their Elysian quiet raise:
But Pleasure's oracle alone
Consult; attentive, not severe.
O Pleasure, we blaspheme not thee;
Nor emulate the rigid knee
Which bends but at the stoic throne.
We own had Fate to man assign'd
Nor sense, nor wish, but what obey
Or Venus soft or Bacchus gay,
Then might our bard's voluptuous creed
Most aptly govern human kind:
Unless perchance what he hath sung
Of tortur'd joints and nerves unstrung,
Some wrangling heretic should plead.
"But now with all these proud desires
For dauntless truth and honest fame;
With that strong master of our frame,
The inexorable judge within,
What can be done? Alas! ve fires
Of love; alas! ye rosy smiles,
Ye nectar'd cups from happier soils,
-Ye have no bribe his grace to win.
BENJAMIN LORD BISHOP OF WINCHESTER.
FOR toils which patriots have endur'd, For treason quell'd and laws secur'd, In every nation Time displays The palm of honourable praise. Envy may rail; and Faction fierce May strive; but what, alas! can those (Though bold, yet blind and sordid foes) To gratitude and love oppose, To faithful story and persuasive verse?
O nurse of Freedom, Albion, say,
Thou tamer of despotic sway,
What man, among thy sons around,
Thus heir to glory hast thou found?
What page, in all thy annals bright,
Hast thou with purer joy survey'd
Than that where Truth, by Hoadly's aid,
Shines through Imposture's solemn shade,
Through kingly and through sacerdotal night?
To him the Teacher bless'd,
Who sent Religion, from the palmy field
By Jordan, like the morn to cheer the west,
And lifted up the veil which Heaven from Earth
conceal'd,
To Hoadly thus his mandate he address'd:
"Go thou, and rescue my dishonour'd law
From hands rapacious and from tongues impure:
Let not my peaceful name be made a lure
Fell Persecution's mortal snares to aid:
Let not my words be impious chains to draw
The freeborn soul in more than brutal awe,
To faith without assent, allegiance unrepaid."
No cold or unperforming hand
Was arm'd by Heaven with this command. The world soon felt it: and, on high,
To William's ear with welcome joy
Did Locke among the blest unfold
The rising hope of Hoadly's name,
Godolphin then confirm'd the fame;
And Somers, when from Earth he came,
And generous Stanhope the fair sequel told.
Then drew the lawgivers around,
(Sires of the Grecian name renown'd)
And listening ask'd, and wondering knew,
What private force could thus subdue
The vulgar and the great combin'd;
Could war with sacred Folly wage;
Could a whole nation disengage
From the dread bonds of many an age,
And to new habits mould the public mind.
For not a conqueror's sword,
Nor the strong powers to civil founders known, Were his but truth by faithful search explord, And social sense, like seed, in genial plenty sown. Wherever it took root, the soul (restor'd
To freedom) freedom too for others sought.
Not monkish craft, the tyrant's claim divine,
Not regal zeal, the bigot's cruel shrine,
Could longer guard from reason's warfare sage;
Not the wild rabble to sedition wrought,
Nor synods by the papal genius taught,
Nor St. John's spirit loose, nor Atterbury's rage.
But where shall recompense be found?
Or how such arduous merit crown'd?
For look on life's laborious scene;
What rugged spaces lie between
Adventurous Virtue's early toils
And her triumphal throne! The shade
Of Death, mean time, does oft invade
Her progress; nor, to us display'd,
Wears the bright heroine her expected spoils.
Yet born to conquer is her power:
-O Hoadly, if that favourite hour
On Earth arrive, with thankful awe
We own just Heaven's indulgent law,
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