The Minstrel; or the Progress of Genius

From Pyrrho’s maze, and Epicurus’ sty;
And held high converse with the godlike few,
Who to the enraptured heart, and ear, and eye,
Teach beauty, virtue, truth, and love, and melody.

XLI

Hence! ye, who snare and stupify the mind,
Sophists, of beauty, virtue, joy, the bane!
Greedy and fell, though impotent and blind,
Who spread your filthy nets in Truth’s fair fane,
And ever ply your venomed fangs amain!
Hence to dark Error’s den, whose rankling slime
First gave you form! hence! lest the Muse should deign,
(Though loath on theme so mean to waste a rhyme),
With vengeance to pursue your sacrilegious crime.

XLII

But hail, ye mighty masters of the lay,
Nature’s true sons, the friends of man and truth!
Whose song, sublimely sweet, serenely gay,
Amused my childhood, and informed my youth.
O let your spirit still my bosom sooth,
Inspire my dreams, and my wild wanderings guide!
Your voice each rugged path of life can smooth;
For well I know, wherever ye reside,
There harmony, and peace, and innocence, abide.

XLIII

Ah me! abandoned on the lonesome plain,
As yet poor Edwin never knew your lore,
Save when against the winter’s drenching rain,
And driving snow, the cottage shut the door.
Then, as instructed by tradition hoar,
Her legends when the Beldam ’gan impart,
Or chant the old heroic ditty o’er,
Wonder and joy ran thrilling to his heart;
Much he the tale admired, but more the tuneful art.

XLIV

Various and strange was the long-winded tale;
And halls, and knights, and feats of arms, displayed;
Or merry swains, who quaff the nut-brown ale,
And sing, enamoured of the nut-brown maid;
The moon-light revel of the fairy glade;
Or hags, that suckle an infernal brood,
And ply in caves the unutterable trade,
’Midst fiends and spectres, quench the moon in blood,
Yell in the midnight storm, or ride the infuriate flood.

XLV

But when to horror his amazement rose,
A gentler strain the Beldam would rehearse,
A tale of rural life, a tale of woes,
The orphan-babes, and guardian uncle fierce.
O cruel! will no pang of pity pierce
That heart by lust of lucre seared to stone!
For sure, if aught of virtue last, or verse,
To latest times shall tender souls bemoan
Those helpless orphan-babes by thy fell arts undone.

XLVI

Behold, with berries smeared, with brambles torn,
The babes, now famished, lay them down to die;
’Midst the wild howl of darksome woods forlorn,
Folded in one another’s arms they lie;
Nor friend, nor stranger, hears their dying cry:
‘For from the town the man returns no more.’
But thou, who Heaven’s just vengeance darest defy,
This deed with fruitless tears shalt soon deplore,
When Death lays waste thy house, and flames consume thy store.

XLVII

A stifled smile of stern vindictive joy
Brightened one moment Edwin’s starting tear. —
‘But why should gold man’s feeble mind decoy,
‘And innocence thus die by doom severe?’
O Edwin! while thy heart is yet sincere,
The assaults of discontent and doubt repel:
Dark even at noontide is our mortal sphere;
But let us hope; to doubt, is to rebel;
Let us exult in hope, that all shall yet be well.

XLVIII

Nor be thy generous indignation checked,
Nor checked the tender tear to misery given;
From Guilt’s contagious power shall that protect,
This soften and refine the soul for heaven.
But dreadful is their doom, whom doubt hath driven
To censure Fate, and pious hope forego;
Like yonder blasted boughs by lightning riven,
Perfection, beauty, life, they never know,
But frown on all that pass, a monument of woe.