264

FANCY - FAREWELL, &c.

-Immortal dreams, that could beguile

The blind old man of Scio's rocky isle

And dream'd again

The visions which arise without a sleep.

BYRON'S Giamır

BYRON'S Lament of Tasso,

Oh! that I were

The viewless spirit of a lovely sound,
A living voice, a breathing harmony,
A bodiless enjoyment-born and dying
With the blest tone which made me !

BYRON'S Manfred.

One of those passing rainbow dreams
Half light, half shade, which Fancy's beams
Paint on the fleeting mists that roll,
In trance or slumber, round the soul.

MOORE'S Lalla Rookh.

Above, below, in ocean and in sky,
Thy fairy worlds, Imagination, lie.

'Mid earthly scenes forgotten or unknown,
Lives in ideal worlds, and wanders there alone.

CAMPBELL.

CARLOS WILCOX.

I give you a legend from Fancy's own sketch,
Tho', I warn you, he's given to fibbing-the wretch !
S. G. GOODRICH.

FATE-FATHER, &c.

265

FATE. (See DESTINY.)

FATHER-MOTHER-PARENTS.

Had doting Priam check'd his son's desire,
Troy had been bright with fame, and not with fire.

The poor wren,

The most diminutive of birds, will fight,

SHAKSPEARE

The young ones in her nest, against the owl.

SHAKSPEARE.

Fathers their children and themselves abuse,
That wealth, a husband, for their daughters choose.

But parents, to their offspring blind,
Consult not parts, nor turn of mind;
But, even in infancy, decree

What this, what th' other son shall be.

For if there be a human tear

From passion's dross refin'd and clear, "Tis that which pious parents shed Upon a duteous daughter's head.

SHIRLEY.

GAY's Fables,

To aid thy mind's development-to watch
The dawn of little joys-to sit and see
Almost thy very growth-to view thee catch
Knowledge of objects-wonders yet to see!
To hold thee lightly on a gentle knee,

And print on thy soft cheek a parent's kiss,-
This, it should seem, was not reserv'd for me;
Yet such was in my nature.

SCOTT.

BYRON'S Childe Harold.

266

FATHER-MOTHER, &c.

My mother! at that holy name
Within my bosom there's a gush
Of feeling, which no time can tame,
A feeling, which, for years of fame,
I would not, could not crush!

GEORGE P. MORRIS.

My heart grew softer as I gazed upon
That youthful mother, as she sooth'd to rest,
With a low song, her lov'd and cherish'd one,
The bud of promise on her gentle breast;
For 't is a sight that angel ones above

May stoop to gaze on from their bowers of bliss,
When Innocence upon the breast of Love

Is cradled, in a sinful world like this.

MRS. A. B. WELBY

Ere yet her child hath drawn its earliest breath,
A mother's love begins-it grows till death!
Lives before life, with death not dies, but seems
The
very
substance of immortal dreams.

A father's heart

Is tender, though the man be made of stone.

Of sighs that speak a father's woe,
Of pangs that none but mothers know.

CHARLES SPRAGUE.

Sweet is the image of the brooding dove !-
Holy as heaven a mother's tender love!
The love of many prayers, and many tears,
Which changes not with dim declining years,—
The only love, which, on this teeming earth,
Asks no return for passion's wayward birth.

MRS. NORTON's Dream.

FAVOUR.

There are smiles and tears in the mother s eyes,
For her new-born infant beside her lies;
Oh, heaven of bliss! when the heart overflows
With the rapture a mother only knows!

267

HENRY WARE.

FAVOUR.

There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to,
That sweet aspect of princes, and their ruin,
More pangs and fears than wars or women have;
And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer,
Never to hope again.

O momentary grace of mortal man,

SHAKSPEARE.

Which we more hunt for than the grace of God!
Who builds his hope in air of your fair looks,

Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast,
Ready with every nod to tumble down
Into the fatal bowels of the deep.

SHAKSPEARE.

"Tis ever thus when favours are denied ;
All had been granted but the thing we beg:
And still some great unlikely substitute-
Your life, your soul, your all of earthly good-
Is proffer'd, in the room of one small boon.

No trifle is so small as what obtains,

JOANNA BAILLIE

Save that which loses favour: 't is a breath
Which hangs upon a smile! A look, a word,
A frown, the air-built tower of fortune shakes,
And down the unsubstantial fabric falls.

HANNAH MORE.

Yet what is wit, and what the poet's art?
Can genius shield the vulnerable heart?
Ah no! where bright imagination reigns,
The fine-wrought spirit feels acuter pains;
Where glow exalted sense and taste refin'd,
There keener anguish rankles in the mind;
There feeling is diffus'd through every part,
Thrills in each nerve, and lives in all the heart;
And those, whose generous souls each tear would keep
From others' eyes, are born themselves to weep.

The soul of music slumbers in the shell,

HANNAH MORE.

Till wak'd and kindled by the master's spell,

And feeling hearts-touch them but lightly-pour
A thousand melodies unheard before.

ROGERS' Human Life

Admire exalt-despise-laugh-weep-for here

There is much matter for all feeling.

BYRON'S Childe Harold.