Book ix
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The gods approve The depth, and not the tumult, of the soul.
_Laodamia._
Mightier far Than strength of nerve or sinew, or the sway Of magic potent over sun and star, Is Love, though oft to agony distrest, And though his favorite seat be feeble woman's breast.
_Laodamia._
Elysian beauty, melancholy grace, Brought from a pensive though a happy place.
_Laodamia._
He spake of love, such love as spirits feel In worlds whose course is equable and pure; No fears to beat away, no strife to heal,-- The past unsighed for, and the future sure.
_Laodamia._
Of all that is most beauteous, imaged there In happier beauty; more pellucid streams, An ampler ether, a diviner air, And fields invested with purpureal gleams.
_Laodamia._
Yet tears to human suffering are due; And mortal hopes defeated and o'erthrown Are mourned by man, and not by man alone.
_Laodamia._
But shapes that come not at an earthly call Will not depart when mortal voices bid.
_Dion._
But thou that didst appear so fair To fond imagination, Dost rival in the light of day Her delicate creation.
_Yarrow Visited._
'T is hers to pluck the amaranthine flower Of faith, and round the sufferer's temples bind Wreaths that endure affliction's heaviest shower, And do not shrink from sorrow's keenest wind.
_Weak is the Will of Man._
We bow our heads before Thee, and we laud And magnify thy name Almighty God! But man is thy most awful instrument In working out a pure intent.
_Ode. Imagination before Content._
Sad fancies do we then affect, In luxury of disrespect To our own prodigal excess Of too familiar happiness.
_Ode to Lycoris._
That kill the bloom before its time, And blanch, without the owner's crime, The most resplendent hair.
_Lament of Mary Queen of Scots._
The sightless Milton, with his hair Around his placid temples curled; And Shakespeare at his side,--a freight, If clay could think and mind were weight, For him who bore the world!
_The Italian Itinerant._
Meek Nature's evening comment on the shows That for oblivion take their daily birth From all the fuming vanities of earth.
_Sky-Prospect from the Plain of France._
Turning, for them who pass, the common dust Of servile opportunity to gold.
_Desultory Stanza._
Babylon, Learned and wise, hath perished utterly, Nor leaves her speech one word to aid the sigh That would lament her.
_Ecclesiastical Sonnets.