Written In A Blank Leaf Of Macphersons Ossian by William Wordsworth

Описание: Written In A Blank Leaf Of Macpherson's Ossian by William Wordsworth

Oft have I caught, upon a fitful breeze,


Fragments of far-off melodies,


With ear not coveting the whole,


A part so charmed the pensive soul.


While a dark storm before my sight


Was yielding, on a mountain height


Loose vapours have I watched, that won


Prismatic colours from the sun;


Nor felt a wish that heaven would show


The image of its perfect bow.


What need, then, of these finished Strains?


Away with counterfeit Remains!


An abbey in its lone recess,


A temple of the wilderness,


Wrecks though they be, announce with feeling


The majesty of honest dealing.


Spirit of Ossian! if imbound


In language thou may'st yet be found,


If aught (entrusted to the pen


Or floating on the tongues of men,


Albeit shattered and impaired)


Subsist thy dignity to guard,


In concert with memorial claim


Of old grey stone, and high-born name


That cleaves to rock or pillared cave


Where moans the blast, or beats the wave,


Let Truth, stern arbitress of all,


Interpret that Original,


And for presumptuous wrongs atone;


Authentic words be given, or none!


Time is not blind; yet He, who spares


Pyramid pointing to the stars,


Hath preyed with ruthless appetite


On all that marked the primal flight


Of the poetic ecstasy


Into the land of mystery.


No tongue is able to rehearse


One measure, Orpheus! of thy verse;


Musaeus, stationed with his lyre


Supreme among the Elysian quire,


Is, for the dwellers upon earth,


Mute as a lark ere morning's birth.


Why grieve for these, though past away


The music, and extinct the lay?


When thousands, by severer doom,


Full early to the silent tomb


Have sunk, at Nature's call; or strayed


From hope and promise, self-betrayed;


The garland withering on their brows;


Stung with remorse for broken vows;


Frantic, else how might they rejoice?


And friendless, by their own sad choice!


Hail, Bards of mightier grasp! on you


I chiefly call, the chosen Few,


Who cast not off the acknowledged guide,


Who faltered not, nor turned aside;


Whose lofty genius could survive


Privation, under sorrow thrive;


In whom the fiery Muse revered


The symbol of a snow-white beard,


Bedewed with meditative tears


Dropped from the lenient cloud of years.


    


Brothers in soul! though distant times


Produced you nursed in various climes,


Ye, when the orb of life had waned,


A plenitude of love retained:


Hence, while in you each sad regret


By corresponding hope was met,


Ye lingered among human kind,


Sweet voices for the passing wind,


Departing sunbeams, loth to stop,


Though smiling on the last hill top!


Such to the tender-hearted maid


Even ere her joys begin to fade;


Such, haply, to the rugged chief


By fortune crushed, or tamed by grief;


Appears, on Morven's lonely shore,


Dim-gleaming through imperfect lore,


The Son of Fingal; such was blind


Maeonides of ampler mind;


Such Milton, to the fountain head


Of glory by Urania led!