Page:The Pleasures of Memory (Rogers).djvu/38


 * Hast thou thro' Eden's wild-wood vales pursued z

Each mountain-scene, majestically rude; To note the sweet simplicity of life, Far from the din of Folly's idle strife: Nor there a while with lifted eye, rever'd That modest stone which pious rear'd; Which still records, beyond the pencil's power, The silent sorrows of a parting hour; Still to the musing pilgrim points the place Her sainted spirit most delights to trace?
 * Thus, with the manly glow of honest pride, a

O'er his dead son the gallant sigh'd. Thus, thro' the gloom of  fairy grove, urn still breathes the voice of love.
 * As the stern grandeur of a Gothic tower

Awes us less deeply in its morning hour, Than when the shades of Time serenely fall On every broken arch and ivied wall; The tender images we love to trace, Steal from each year a melancholy grace! And as the sparks of social love expand, As the heart opens in a foreign land; And, with a brother's warmth, a brother's smile, The stranger greets each native of his isle; So scenes of life, when present and confest, Stamp but their bolder features on the breast; Yet not an image, when remotely view'd, However trivial, and however rude, But wins the heart, and wakes the social sigh, With every claim of close affinity!
 * But these pure joys the world can never know;

In gentler climes their silver currents flow. Oft at the silent, shadowy close of day, When the hush'd grove has sung its parting lay; When pensive Twilight, in her dusky car, Comes slowly on to meet the evening-star;