The Delights of Fancy

Again the summer shines! with mightier flame The Sun exults his lengthen'd course to roll, And wide diffuses through the human frame A languid bliss that melts the poet's soul.

It melts the soul, but gives the pow'r to sing Those visionary scenes itself inspires; Tunes it to harmonies of noblest string, And bids it glow with more than mortal fires.

Great Life of all the world, and Lord of day! Best symbol of our common Maker's might! Well might th' unguided heathen thee obey, And prostrate hail thy orb's returning light;

For oft myself have felt thy rapt'rous heat Steal o'er my senses like a fairy dream; Then, when my yielding limbs have sought retreat, And sunk in silence near some shaded stream;

My soul, on Fancy's wing sublimely borne, Hath mus'd of scenes too bright for mortal eye; Hath seen white robes by saints and martyrs worn, And heard th' eternal carols of the sky.

Oft too luxuriant Fancy reigns alone, And calls from fablers old a varying band; And scenes of bliss to waking life unknown, Rise, change, and vanish, as she gives command.

Imagination works with all her pow'rs, And gorgeous Knights in glitt'ring troops are seen, And courteous squires, and dwarfs, and moated tow'rs, And all the splendours of the gothick scene.

Bards too of other times resume their lyres! The glorious tale that Chaucer's Knight hath told Sounds in mine ears, and fills me with its fires: And now the jousting warriours I behold,

And Palamon is to the stake convey'd: Now from the earth upstarts th' infernal fiend; Now dying Arcite wills the dear bought maid, If she can ever love, to love his friend.

Anon prince Arthur's blazing shield o'erthrows The giant conqueror of the Red Cross Knight; Or ruthless Talus drives his host of foes With unrelenting flail and iron might.

Dear scenes of blest delusion! golden dreams! And always innocent, and always new! Where oft with truths sublime the fiction teems, And Virtue's noblest patterns strike the view:

Ye feed the fancy, nor seduce the heart! For from our reach remote your actions lie; No youth can now assume Pyrochles' part, No modern maid like poor Parthenia die.

Not so the spurious and destructive brood, The graceless toys of more enlighten'd times, That teach the child to languish to be woo'd, Create her follies, and contrive her crimes:

These clear the paths to ruin and to shame: Perhaps, by these poor Delia was undone! Delia! whose lost and desolated fame Friendship can only weep, and virtue shun!

But O! the gorgeous tales of earlier days, Where fancy shines in mystick fiction bright; Where chastity is woman's fairest praise, And virtue's cause inspires the vent'rous knight;

Be these my choice! and who, by these refin'd, Would bear the bus'ness of life's publick croud; Would change these wand'rings of th' enchanted mind For all the splendid slav'ry of the proud.

But these to few are giv'n:—unknown they lie, Unsought, unhonour'd, by the venal herd Where purseproud wealth can injur'd worth defy, And poverty alone is shunn'd and fear'd.

Unknown they lie where sturdy labour lives And earns with ceaseless care his scanty meal; Oft too where chance the pow'rs of leisure gives, Superior fate denies the pow'r to feel.

Yet some perchance, in this tempestuous time Some still remain, and sure not meanly blest, Whose rambling thoughts have reach'd this rapt'rous clime, And view'd these scenes of fancy and of rest.

For them all nature breathes elysian grace, And sweets ambrosial stream from every flow'r; Fairies for them the green-sward ringlets trace, And magick's mightiest influence guards their bow'r.

And should blest Competence from heav'n descend, And from a patron's will their freedom save; To such, congenial with myself, I'll bend, And consecrate the verse these visions gave.