The Seasons: A Poem Compared with the London and Edinburgh Editions

Front Cover
Clarke, 1854 - 168 pages
 

Contents

I
7
II
39
III
125
IV
155

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Popular passages

Page 156 - As home he goes beneath the joyous moon. Ye that keep watch in heaven, as earth asleep Unconscious lies, effuse your mildest beams, Ye constellations, while your angels strike, Amid the spangled sky, the silver lyre.
Page 153 - Tis done ! dread Winter spreads his latest glooms, And reigns tremendous o'er the conquer'd year. How dead the vegetable kingdom lies ! How dumb the tuneful! Horror wide extends His desolate domain. Behold, fond man ! See here thy pictured life ; pass some few years, Thy flowering Spring, thy Summer's ardent strength, Thy sober Autumn fading into age, And pale concluding Winter comes at last, And shuts the scene.
Page 130 - The mountain thunders ; and its sturdy sons Stoop to the bottom of the rocks they shade. Lone on the midnight steep, and all aghast, The dark wayfaring stranger breathless toils, And, often falling, climbs against the blast.
Page 78 - Heavens! what a goodly prospect spreads around, Of hills, and dales, and woods, and lawns, and spires, And glittering towns, and gilded streams, till all The stretching landscape into smoke decays!
Page 133 - In vain for him th' officious wife prepares The fire fair-blazing, and the vestment warm ; In vain his little children, peeping out Into the mingling storm, demand their sire, With tears of artless innocence. Alas ! Nor wife, nor children, more shall he behold; Nor friends, nor sacred home.
Page 153 - Spring, thy Summer's ardent strength, Thy sober Autumn fading into age, And pale concluding Winter comes at last And shuts the scene. Ah! whither now are fled Those dreams of greatness? those unsolid hopes Of happiness? those longings after fame? Those restless cares? those busy bustling days? Those gay-spent festive nights? those veering thoughts, Lost between good and ill, that shared thy life?
Page 37 - Delightful task ! to rear the tender thought, To teach the young idea how to shoot, To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind, To breathe the enlivening spirit, and to fix The generous purpose in the glowing breast.
Page 70 - And following slower, in explosion vast, The Thunder raises his tremendous voice. At first, heard solemn o'er the verge of heaven, The tempest growls ; but as it nearer comes, And rolls its awful burden on the wind, The lightnings flash a larger curve, and more The noise astounds : till over head a sheet Of livid flame discloses wide ; then shuts, And opens wider ; shuts and opens still Expansive, wrapping ether in a blaze.
Page 7 - COME, gentle Spring, ethereal mildness, come ; And from the bosom of yon dropping cloud, "While music wakes around, veil'd in a shower Of shadowing roses, on our plains descend.
Page 38 - And thus their moments fly. The Seasons thus, As ceaseless round a jarring world they roll, Still find them happy; and consenting SPRING Sheds her own rosy garland on their heads: Till evening comes at last, serene and mild; When after the long vernal day of life, Enamour'd more, as more remembrance swells With many a proof of recollected love, Together down they sink in social sleep ; Together freed, their gentle spirits fly To scenes where love and bliss immortal reign.

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