In Still Retreats

Beatus ille, suave mari magno... A mise en abyme from James Thomson's   The Seasons (Autumn):

 

 

 

Let others brave the flood in quest of gain,

And beat, for joyless months, the gloomy wave.

Let such as deem it glory to destroy,

Rush into blood, the sack of cities seek;

Unpierc'd, exulting in the widow's wail,

The virgin's shriek, and infant's trembling cry.

Let some, far distant from their native soil,

Urg'd or by want or hardened avarice,

Find other lands beneath another sun.

Let this through cities work his eager way,

By legal outrage and establish'd guile,

The social sense extinct; and that ferment

Mad into tumult the seditious herd,

Or melt them down to slavery. Let these

Insnare the wretched in the toils of law,

Fomenting discord, and preplexing right,

An iron race! And those of fairer front,

But equal inhumanity, in courts,

Delusive pomp, and dark cabals, delight:

Wreath the deep bow, diffuse the lying smile,

And tread the weary labyrinth of state.

While he, from all the stormy passions free

That restless Men involve, hears, and but hears,

At distance safe, the human tempest roar,

Wrapt close in conscious peace. The fall of kings,

The rage of nations, and the crush of states,

Move not the Man, who, from the world escap'd,

In still retreats, and flowery solitudes,

To Nature's voice attends, from month to month,

And day to day, thro' the revolving year,

Admiring, sees her in her every shape;

Feels all her sweet emotions at his heart;

Takes what she liberal gives, nor thinks of more.

He, when young Spring protrudes the bursting gems,

Marks the first bud, and sucks the healthful gale

Into his freshened soul; her genial hours

He full enjoys, and not a beauty blows,

And not an opening blossom breathes in vain.

In Summer he, beneath the living shade,

Such as o'er frigid Tempe want to wave,

Or Hemus cool, reads what the Muse, of these

Perhaps, has in immortal numbers sung;

Or what she dictates writes: and, oft an eye

Shot round, rejoices in the vigorous year.

When Autumn's yellow lustre gilds the world,

And tempts the sickled swain into the field,

Seiz'd by the general joy, his heart distends

With gentle throes; and, thro' the tepid gleams

Deep musing, then he best exerts his song.

Even Winter wild to him is full of bliss.

The mighty tempest, and the hoary waste,

Abrupt, and deep, stretch'd o'er the buried earth,

Awake to solemn thought. At night the skies,

Disclos'd, and kindled, by refining frost,

Pour every lustre on th'exalted eye.

A friend, a book, the stealing hours secure,

And mark them down for wisdom. With swift wing,

O'er land and sea imagination roams;

Or truth, divinely breaking on his mind,

Elates his being, and unfolds his powers;

Or in his breast heroic virtue burns.

The touch of kindred too and love he feels;

The modest eye, whose beams on his alone

Ecstatic shine; the little strong embrace

Of prattling children, twin'd around his neck,

And emulous to please him, calling forth

The fond parental soul. Nor purpose gay,

Amusement, dance, or song, he sternly scorns;

For happiness and true philosophy

Are of the social still, and smiling kind.

This is the life which those who fret in guilt,

And guilty cities, never knew; the life,

Led by primeval ages, uncorrupt,

When angels dwelt, and God himself, with Man!

 

Oh Nature! all sufficient! Over all!

Enrich me with the knowledge of thy works!

Snatch me to heaven; thy rolling wonders there,

World beyond world, in infinite extent,

Profusely scattered o'er the blue immense,

Shew me; their motions, periods, and their laws,

Given me to scan; thro' the disclosing deep

Light my blind way: the mineral strata there;

Thrust, blooming, thence the vegetable world;

O'er that the rising system, more complex,

Of animals; and higher still, the mind,

The varied scene of quick compounded thought,

And where the mixing passions endless shift;

These ever open to my ravish'd eye;

A search, the flight of time can ne'er exhaust!

But if to that unequal; if the blood,

In sluggish streams about my heart, forbid

That best ambition; under closing shades,

Inglorious, lay me by the lowly brook,

And whisper to my dreams. From Thee begin,

Dwell all on Thee, with Thee conclude my song;

And let me never, never stray from Thee!