Eighteenth-Century Audio

Source: UMW. Download Title

When Learning’s triumph o’er her barbarous foes
First reared the stage, immortal Shakespeare rose;
Each change of many-coloured life he drew,
Exhausted worlds, and then imagined new:
Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign,
And panting Time toiled after him in vain:
His powerful strokes presiding Truth impressed,
And unresisted Passion stormed the breast.

Then Jonson came, instructed from the school,
To please in method, and invent by rule;
His studious patience, and laborious art,
By regular approach essayed the heart;
Cold Approbation gave the lingering bays,
For those who durst not censure, scarce could praise.
A mortal born he met the general doom,
But left, like Egypt’s kings, a lasting tomb.

The Wits of Charles found easier ways to fame,
Nor wished for Jonson’s art, or Shakespeare’s flame,
Themselves they studied, as they felt, they writ,
Intrigue was plot, obscenity was wit.
Vice always found a sympathetic friend;
They pleased their age, and did not aim to mend.
Yet bards like these aspired to lasting praise,
And proudly hoped to pimp in future days.
Their cause was general, their supports were strong,
Their slaves were willing, and their reign was long;
Till Shame regained the post that Sense betrayed,
And Virtue called Oblivion to her aid.

Then crushed by rules, and weakened as refined,
For years the power of tragedy declined;
From bard, to bard, the frigid caution crept,
Till Declamation roared, while Passion slept.
Yet still did Virtue deign the stage to tread,
Philosophy remained, though Nature fled.
But forced at length her ancient reign to quit,
She saw great Faustus lay the ghost of wit:
Exulting Folly hailed the joyful day,
And pantomime, and song, confirmed her sway.

But who the coming changes can presage,
And mark the future periods of the stage?
Perhaps if skill could distant times explore,
New Behns, new Durfeys, yet remain in store.
Perhaps, where Lear has raved, and Hamlet died,
On flying cars new sorcerers may ride.
Perhaps, for who can guess the effects of chance?
Here Hunt may box, or Mahomet may dance.

Hard is his lot, that here by Fortune placed,
Must watch the wild vicissitudes of taste;
With every meteor of caprice must play,
And chase the new-blown bubbles of the day.
Ah! let not censure term our fate our choice,
The stage but echoes back the public voice.
The drama’s laws the drama’s patrons give,
For we that live to please, must please to live.

Then prompt no more the follies you decry,
As tyrants doom their tools of guilt to die;
‘Tis yours this night to bid the reign commence
Of rescued Nature, and reviving Sense;
To chase the charms of Sound, the pomp of Show,
For useful Mirth, and salutary Woe;
Bid scenic Virtue form the rising age,
And Truth diffuse her radiance from the stage.

Source: UMW. Download Title

Source: UMW. Download link

Source: UMW. Download link 

CONDEMN’D to hope’s delusive mine,
As on we toil from day to day,
By sudden blasts, or slow decline,
Our social comforts drop away.

Well tried through many a varying year,
See Levet to the grave descend;
Officious, innocent, sincere,
Of ev’ry friendless name the friend.

Yet still he fills affection’s eye,
Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind;
Nor, letter’d arrogance, deny
Thy praise to merit unrefin’d.

When fainting nature call’d for aid,
And hov’ring death prepar’d the blow,
His vig’rous remedy display’d
The power of art without the show.

In misery’s darkest caverns known,
His useful care was ever nigh,
Where hopeless anguish pour’d his groan,
And lonely want retir’d to die.

No summons mock’d by chill delay,
No petty gain disdain’d by pride,
The modest wants of ev’ry day
The toil of ev’ry day supplied.

His virtues walk’d their narrow round,
Nor made a pause, nor left a void;
And sure th’ Eternal Master found
The single talent well-employ’d.

The busy day, the peaceful night,
Unfelt, uncounted, glided by;
His frame was firm, his powers were bright,
Tho’ now his eightieth year was nigh.

Then with no throbbing fiery pain,
No cold gradations of decay,
Death broke at once the vital chain,
And free’d his soul the nearest way.

Source: UMW. Text.
Download link 

Source: UMW. Download link 

Adieu dear object of my Love’s excess,
And with thee all my hopes of happiness,
With the same fervent and unchanged heart
Which did it’s whole self once to thee impart,
(And which though fortune has so sorely bruis’d,
Would suffer more, to be from this excus’d)
I to resign thy dear Converse submit,
Since I can neither keep, nor merit it.
Thou hast too long to me confined been,
Who ruine am without, passion within.
My mind is sunk below thy tenderness,
And my condition does deserve it less;
I’m so entangl’d and so lost a thing
By all the shocks my daily sorrow bring,
That would’st thou for thy old Orinda call
Thou hardly could’st unravel her at all.
And should I thy clear fortunes interline
With the incessant miseries of mine?
No, no, I never lov’d at such a rate
To tye thee to the rigours of my fate,
As from my obligations thou art free,
Sure thou shalt be so from my Injury,
Though every other worthiness I miss,
Yet I’le at least be generous in this.
I’d rather perish without sigh or groan,
Then thou shoul’dst be condemn’d to give me one;
Nay in my soul I rather could allow
Friendship should be a sufferer, then thou;
Go then, since my sad heart has set thee free,
Let all the loads and chains remain on me.
Though I be left the prey of sea and wind,
Thou being happy wilt in that be kind;
Nor shall I my undoing much deplore,
Since thou art safe, whom I must value more.
Oh! mayst thou ever be so, and as free
From all ills else, as from my company,
And may the torments thou hast had from it
Be all that heaven will to thy life permit.
And that they may thy vertue service do,
Mayest thou be able to forgive them too:
But though I must this sharp submission learn,
I cannot yet unwish thy dear concern.
Not one new comfort I expect to see,
I quit my Joy, hope, life, and all but thee;
Nor seek I thence ought that may discompose
That mind where so serene a goodness grows.
I ask no inconvenient kindness now,
To move thy passion, or to cloud thy brow;
And thou wilt satisfie my boldest plea
By some few soft remembrances of me, [50]
Which may present thee with this candid thought,
I meant not all the troubles that I brought.
Own not what Passion rules, and Fate does crush,
But wish thou couldst have don’t without a blush,
And that I had been, ere it was too late,
Either more worthy, or more fortunate.
Ah who can love the thing they cannot prize?
But thou mayst pity though thou dost despise.
Yet I should think that pity bought too dear,
If it should cost those precious Eyes a tear.

Oh may no minutes trouble, thee possess,
But to endear the next hours happiness;
And maist thou when thou art from me remov’d,
Be better pleas’d, but never worse belov’d:
Oh pardon me for pow’ring out my woes
In Rhime now, that I dare not do’t in Prose.
For I must lose whatever is call’d dear,
And thy assistance all that loss to bear,
And have more cause than ere I had before,
To fear that I shall never see thee more.

Source: UMW. Download link 

Text

Source: UMW. Download link 

Forbear, bold youth; all ’s heaven here,
And what you do aver
To others courtship may appear,
‘Tis sacrilege to her.
She is a public deity;
And were ‘t not very odd
She should dispose herself to be
A petty household god?

First make the sun in private shine
And bid the world adieu,
That so he may his beams confine
In compliment to you:
But if of that you do despair,
Think how you did amiss
To strive to fix her beams which are
More bright and large than his.

Source: UMW. Download link 

Source: UMW. Download link

THOU youngest virgin-daughter of the skies,
Made in the last promotion of the blest;
Whose palms, new pluck’d from Paradise,
In spreading branches more sublimely rise,
Rich with immortal green above the rest:
Whether, adopted to some neighbouring star,
Thou roll’st above us, in thy wandering race,
Or, in procession fixt and regular,
Mov’d with the heaven’s majestic pace;
Or, call’d to more superior bliss,
Thou tread’st with seraphims the vast abyss:
Whatever happy region is thy place,
Cease thy celestial song a little space;
Thou wilt have time enough for hymns divine,
Since Heaven’s eternal year is thine.
Hear, then, a mortal Muse thy praise rehearse,
In no ignoble verse;
But such as thy own voice did practise here,
When thy first-fruits of Poesy were given,
To make thyself a welcome inmate there;
While yet a young probationer,
And candidate of heaven.

If by traduction came thy mind,
Our wonder is the less, to find
A soul so charming from a stock so good;
Thy father was transfus’d into thy blood:
So wert thou born into the tuneful strain,
An early, rich, and inexhausted vein.
But if thy pre-existing soul
Was form’d at first with myriads more,
It did through all the mighty poets roll
Who Greek or Latin laurels wore,
And was that Sappho last, which once it was before.
If so, then cease thy flight, O heaven-born mind!
Thou hast no dross to purge from thy rich ore:
Nor can thy soul a fairer mansion find,
Than was the beauteous frame she left behind:
Return, to fill or mend the quire of thy celestial kind.

May we presume to say, that, at thy birth,
New joy was sprung in heaven as well as here on earth?
For sure the milder planets did combine
On thy auspicious horoscope to shine,
And even the most malicious were in trine.
Thy brother-angels at thy birth
Strung each his lyre, and tun’d it high,
That all the people of the sky
Might know a poetess was born on earth;
And then, if ever, mortal ears
Had heard the music of the spheres.
And if no clust’ring swarm of bees
On thy sweet mouth distill’d their golden dew,
‘Twas that such vulgar miracles
Heaven had not leisure to renew:
For all the blest fraternity of love
Solemniz’d there thy birth, and kept thy holiday above.

O gracious God! how far have we
Profan’d thy heavenly gift of Poesy!
Made prostitute and profligate the Muse,
Debas’d to each obscene and impious use,
Whose harmony was first ordain’d above,
For tongues of angels and for hymns of love!
O wretched we! why were we hurried down
This lubrique and adulterate age
(Nay, added fat pollutions of our own),
To increase the streaming ordures of the stage?
What can we say to excuse our second fall?
Let this thy Vestal, Heaven, atone for all!
Her Arethusian stream remains unsoil’d,
Unmixt with foreign filth, and undefil’d;
Her wit was more than man, her innocence a child.

Art she had none, yet wanted none,
For Nature did that want supply:
So rich in treasures of her own,
She might our boasted stores defy:
Such noble vigour did her verse adorn,
That it seem’d borrow’d, where ’twas only born.
Her morals, too, were in her bosom bred,
By great examples daily fed,
What in the best of books, her father’s life, she read.
And to be read herself she need not fear;
Each test, and every light, her Muse will bear,
Though Epictetus with his lamp were there.
Even love (for love sometimes her Muse exprest)
Was but a lambent flame which play’d about her breast,
Light as the vapours of a morning dream;
So cold herself, whilst she such warmth exprest,
‘Twas Cupid bathing in Diana’s stream….

Now all those charms, that blooming grace,
The well-proportion’d shape, and beauteous face,
Shall never more be seen by mortal eyes;
In earth the much-lamented virgin lies.
Not wit, nor piety could fate prevent;
Nor was the cruel destiny content
To finish all the murder at a blow,
To sweep at once her life and beauty too;
But, like a harden’d felon, took a pride
To work more mischievously slow,
And plunder’d first, and then destroy’d.
O double sacrilege on things divine,
To rob the relic, and deface the shrine!
But thus Orinda died:
Heaven, by the same disease, did both translate;
As equal were their souls, so equal was their fate.

Meantime, her warlike brother on the seas
His waving streamers to the winds displays,
And vows for his return, with vain devotion, pays.
Ah, generous youth! that wish forbear,
The winds too soon will waft thee here!
Slack all thy sails, and fear to come,
Alas, thou know’st not, thou art wreck’d at home!
No more shalt thou behold thy sister’s face,
Thou hast already had her last embrace.
But look aloft, and if thou kenn’st from far,
Among the Pleiads a new kindl’d star,
If any sparkles than the rest more bright,
‘Tis she that shines in that propitious light.

When in mid-air the golden trump shall sound,
To raise the nations under ground;
When, in the Valley of Jehoshaphat,
The judging God shall close the book of Fate,
And there the last assizes keep
For those who wake and those who sleep;
When rattling bones together fly
From the four corners of the sky;
When sinews o’er the skeletons are spread,
Those cloth’d with flesh, and life inspires the dead;
The sacred poets first shall hear the sound,
And foremost from the tomb shall bound,
For they are cover’d with the lightest ground;
And straight, with inborn vigour, on the wing,
Like mounting larks, to the new morning sing.
There thou, sweet Saint, before the quire shalt go,
As harbinger of Heaven, the way to show,
The way which thou so well hast learn’d below.