See stern oppression's iron grip, Or mad ambition's gory hand, Truth, weeping, tells the mournful tale, Whose toil upholds the glittering show, Some coarser substance, unrefined, Placed for her lordly use, thus far, thus vile, below; Regardless of the tears, and unavailing prayers! "O ye! who, sunk in beds of down, Stretch'd on his straw he lays himself to sleep, But shall thy legal rage pursue A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss!" I heard nae mair, for chanticleer But deep this truth impress'd my mind- The heart benevolent and kind The most resembles God. DESPONDENCY. AN ODE. I. OPPRESS'D with grief, oppress'd with care, A burden more than I can bear, I sit me down and sigh: O life! thou art a galling load, To wretches such as I! Dim backward as I cast my view, What sickening scenes appear! What sorrows yet may pierce me through, Too justly I may fear! Still caring, despairing, Must be my bitter doom; My woes here shall close ne'er, II. Happy, ye sons of busy life, No other view regard! E'en when the wished end's denied, Meet every sad returning night, How blest the solitary's lot, Within his humble cell, Or, haply, to his evening thought, By unfrequented stream. The ways of men are distant brought, A faint collected dream: While praising and raising His thoughts to heaven on high, As wandering, meandering, He views the solemn sky. IV. Than I, no lonely hermit placed With self-respecting art: But ah! those pleasures, loves, and joys, Or human love or hate, V. O! enviable, early days, When dancing thoughtless pleasure's maze, To care, to guilt unknown! How ill exchanged for riper times, To feel the follies, or the crimes, Of others, or my own! Belyve the elder bairns come drapping in, At service out, amang the farmers roun': Some ca' the pleugh, some herd, some tentie rin A cannie errand to a neebor town: Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown, In youthfu' bloom, love sparkling in her e'e, Comes hame, perhaps, to show a braw new gown, Or deposit her sair-won penny-fee, To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be. V. Wi' joy unfeign'd, brothers and sisters meet, An' each for others' weelfare kindly spiers: The social hours, swift-wing'd, unnoticed fleet; Each tells the uncos that he sees or hears; The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years; Anticipation forward points the view. The mother, wi' her needle an' her sheers, Gars auld claes look amaist as weel's the new: The father mixes a' wi' admonition due. VI. Their master's an' their mistress's command, An' ne'er, though out o' sight, to jauk or play: An' O! be sure to fear the Lord alway! An' mind your duty, duly, morn an' night! Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray, Implore his counsel and assisting might: They never sought in vain that sought the Lord aright!" VII. But hark! a rap comes gently to the door; Jenny, wha kens the meaning o' the same, Tells how a neebor lad cam o'er the moor, To do some errands, and convoy her hame. The wily mother sees the conscious flame Sparkle in Jenny's e'e, and flush her cheek; With heart-struck, anxious care, inquires his name, While Jenny hafflins is afraid to speak; Weel pleased the mother hears, it's nae wild, worthless rake. VIII. Wi' kindly welcome Jenny brings him ben; What makes the youth sae bashfu' an' sae grave; Weel pleased to think her bairn's respected like the lave. IX. O happy love! where love like this is found! O heartfelt raptures! bliss beyond compare! I've paced much this weary mortal round, And sage experience bids me this declare"If heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare, One cordial in this melancholy vale, 'Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair, In other's arms breathe out the tender tale, Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the evening gale." X. Is there, in human form, that bears a heart- Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth? Points to the parents fondling o'er their child? Then paints the ruin'd maid, and their distraction wild? XI. But now the supper crowns their simple board, The halesome parritch, chief o' Scotia's food: The soupe their only hawkie does afford, That 'yont the hallan snugly chows her cood: The dame brings forth in complimental mood, To grace the lad, her weel-hain'd kebbuck, fell, An' aft he's prest, an' aft he ca's it guid; The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell, How 'twas a towmond auld, sin' lint was i' the bell. XII. The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face, His lyart haffets wearing thin an' bare; XIII. They chant their artless notes in simple guise; The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays : Compared with these, Italian trills are tame; The tickled ears no heartfelt raptures raise; Nae unison hae they with our Creator's praise. XIV. The priest-like father reads the sacred page, How Abram was the friend of God on high; Or, Moses bade eternal warfare wage With Amalek's ungracious progeny; Or how the royal bard did groaning lie Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire; Or, Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing cry; Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire; Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. XV. Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme, The precepts sage they wrote to many a land: How he, who lone in Patmos banished, Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand; And heard great Babylon's doom pronounced by Heaven's command. XVI. Then kneeling down, to Heaven's Eternal King, The saint, the father, and the husband prays: Hope "springs exulting on triumphant wing," That thus they all shall meet in future days: There ever bask in uncreated rays, No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear, Together hymning their Creator's praise, In such society, yet still more dear; [sphere. While circling time moves round in an eternal XVII. Compared with this, how poor religion's pride, Devotion's every grace, except the heart! The Power, incensed, the pageant will desert, The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole ; But haply, in some cottage far apart, May hear, well pleased, the language of the soul; And in his book of life the inmates poor enrol. XVIII. Then homeward all take off their several way; And proffer up to Heaven the warm request From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs, That makes her loved at home, revered abroad: Princes and lords are but the breath of kings, "An honest man's the noblest work of God:" And certes, in fair virtue's heavenly road, The cottage leaves the palace far behind; What is a lordling's pomp? a cumbrous load, Disguising oft the wretch of human kind, Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refined! Pope's Windsor Forest. |