"So fails, so languishes, grows dim, and dies," The gray-haired Wanderer pensively exclaimed, "All that this world is proud of. From their spheres
The stars of human glory are cast down; Perish the roses and the flowers of kings, Princes, and emperors, and the crowns and palms Of all the mighty, withered and consumed! Nor is power given to lowliest innocence Long to protect her own. The man himself Departs; and soon is spent the line of those Who, in the bodily image, in the mind, In heart or soul, in station or pursuit, Did most resemble him. Degrees and ranks, Fraternities and orders,- heaping high New wealth upon the burden of the old, And placing trust in privilege confirmed And reconfirmed, are scoffed at with a smile Of greedy foretaste, from the secret stand Of Desolation aimed: to slow decline
These yield, and these to sudden overthrow: Their virtue, service, happiness, and state Expire; and nature's pleasant robe of green, Humanity's appointed shroud, enwraps
Their monuments and their memory. The vast Frame
Of social nature changes evermore Her organs and her members with decay Restless, and restless generation, powers And functions dying and produced at need, —
And by this law the mighty whole subsists: With an ascent and progress in the main; Yet O how disproportioned to the hopes
And expectations of self-flattering minds!
"The courteous Knight, whose bones are here
Lived in an age conspicuous as our own For strife and ferment in the minds of men ; Whence alteration in the forms of things, Various and vast. A memorable age! Which did to him assign a pensive lot,- To linger 'mid the last of those bright clouds That, on the steady breeze of honor, sailed In long procession calm and beautiful.
He who had seen his own bright order fade, And its devotion gradually decline, (While war, relinquishing the lance and shield, Her temper changed, and bowed to other laws,) Had also witnessed, in his morn of life, That violent commotion, which o'erthrew, In town and city and sequestered glen, Altar, and cross, and church of solemn roof, And old religious house, pile after pile; And shook their tenants out into the fields, Like wild beasts without home! Their hour was
But why no softening thought of gratitude,
No just remembrance, scruple, or wise doubt?
Benevolence is mild; nor borrows help,
Save at worst need, from bold, impetuous force, Fitliest allied to anger and revenge. But Human-kind rejoices in the might Of mutability; and airy hopes, Dancing around her, hinder and disturb Those meditations of the soul that feed The retrospective virtues. Festive songs Break from the maddened nations at the sight Of sudden overthrow; and cold neglect
Is the sure consequence of slow decay.
"Even," said the Wanderer, "as that courteous Knight,
Bound by his vow to labor for redress Of all who suffer wrong, and to enact By sword and lance the law of gentleness, (If I may venture of myself to speak, Trusting that not incongruously I blend Low things with lofty,) I too shall be doomed To outlive the kindly use and fair esteem Of the poor calling which my youth embraced With no unworthy prospect. But enough;- Thoughts crowd upon me,· and 't were seemlier
To stop, and yield our gracious Teacher thanks For the pathetic records which his voice Hath here delivered; words of heart-felt truth, Tending to patience when affliction strikes ; To hope and love; to confident repose In God; and reverence for the dust of Man."
Pastor's Apology and apprehensions that he might have detained his Auditors too long, with the Pastor's Invitation to his House. Solitary disinclined to comply; rallies the Wanderer; and playfully draws a comparison between his itinerant profession and that of the Knight-errant; which leads to Wanderer's giving an account of changes in the Country from the manufacturing spirit. - Favorable effects. The other side of the picture, and chiefly as it has affected the humbler classes. Wanderer asserts the hollowness of all national grandeur if unsupported by mcral worth. - Physical Science unable to support itself. Lamentations over an excess of manufacturPicture ing industry among the humbler Classes of Society. of a Child employed in a Cotton-mill. - Ignorance and degradation of Children among the agricultural Population reviewed. Conversation broken off by a renewed Invitation from the Pastor. - Path leading to his House.-Its appearance described. His Daughter. His Wife. — His Son (a Boy) enters with his Companion. Their happy appearance. -The Wanderer how affected by the sight of them.
« ForrigeFortsæt » |