TO SUPERSTITION.

I. 1.

HENCE to the realms of Night, dire demon, hence! Thy chain of adamant can bind

That little world, the human mind, And sink its noblest powers to impotence. Wake the lion's loudest roar,

Clot his shaggy mane with gore,

With flashing fury bid his eyeballs shine,
Meek is his savage sullen soul to thine!

Thy touch, thy deadening touch has steel'd the breast*

[smiled, Whence, through her rainbow shower, soft Pity Has closed the heart each godlike virtue bless'd To all the silent pleadings of his child.

At thy command he plants the dagger deep, At thy command exults, though Nature bids him

weep.

I. 2.

When, with a frown that froze the peopled earth +,
Thou dartedst thy huge head from high,
Night waved her banners o'er the sky,
And, brooding, gave her shapeless shadows birth.
Rocking on the billowy air,

Ha! what withering phantoms glare!

As blows the blast with many a sudden swell,
At each dead pause what shrill toned voices yell!

• An allusion to the sacrifice of Iphigenia.

+ Lucretius, I. 63.

The sheeted spectre, rising from the tomb,
Points at the murderer's stab, and shudders by;
In every grove is felt a heavier gloom,

That veils its genius from the vulgar eye:
The spirit of the water rides the storm,

And, through the mist, reveals the terrors of his form.

I. 3.

O'er solid seas, where Winter reigns,
And holds each mountain wave in chains,
The fur-clad savage, ere he guides his deer
By glistering starlight through the snow,
Breathes softly in her wondering ear
Each potent spell thou badest him know.
By thee inspired, on India's sands +,
Full in the sun the Bramin stands;
And, while the panting tigress hies
To quench her fever in the stream,
His spirit laughs in agonies +,

Smit by the scorchings of the noontide beam.
Mark who mounts the sacred pyre,
Blooming in her bridal vest;

She hurls the torch! she fans the fire!
To die is to be bless'd§:

She clasps her lord to part no more,
And, sighing, sinks! but sinks to soar.

* When we were ready to set out, our host muttered some words in the ear of our cattle.-See a Voyage to the North of Europe in 1653.

+ The Bramins expose their bodies to the intense heat of the

sun.

1 Ridens moriar. The conclusion of an old Runic Ode.

In the Vedas, or sacred writings of the Hindoos, it is written, She who dies with her husband shall live for ever with him in heaven.'

O'ershadowing Scotia's desert coast,
The sisters sail in dusky state *;

And, wrapp'd in clouds, in tempests toss'd,
Weave the airy web of fate;

While the lone shepherd, near the shipless maint, Sees o'er her hills advance the long-drawn funeral

train.

II. 1.

Thou spakest, and lo! a new creation glow'd.
Each unhewn mass of naked stone
Was clad in horrors not its own,

And at its base the trembling nations bow'd.
Giant Error, darkly grand,

Grasp'd the globe with iron hand.

Circled with seats of bliss, the Lord of Light
Saw prostrate worlds adore his golden height.
The statue, waking with immortal powers ‡,
Springs from its parent earth, and shakes the
spheres ;

The indignant pyramid sublimely towers,
And braves the effort of a host of years.
Sweet Music breathes her soul into the wind,
And bright-eyed Painting stamps the image of
the mind.

II. 2.

Round their rude ark old Egypt's sorcerers rise!
A timbrel'd anthem swells the gale,
And bids the God of Thunders hail §,
With lowings loud the captive God replies.

*The Fates of the Northern Mythology.-See Mallet's Antiquities.

† An allusion to the second sight.

See that fine description of the sudden animation of the Palladium, in the second book of the Eneid.

The bull, Apis.

Clouds of incense woo hy smile,
Scaly monarch of the Nile*!

But ah! what myriads claim the bended knee + ! Go, count the busy drops that swell the sea. Proud land! what eye can trace thy mystic lore, Lock'd up in characters as dark as night? What eye those long long labyrinths dare explore §,

To which the parted soul oft wings her flight; Again to visit her cold cell of clay, [decay! Charm'd with perennial sweets, and smiling at II. 3.

On yon hoar summit, mildly bright ||
With purple ether's liquid light,

High o'er the world the white-robed Magi gaze
On dazzling bursts of heavenly fire;

Start at each blue portentous blaze,

Each flame that flits with adverse spire;
But say, what sounds my ear invade ¶
From Delphi's venerable shade?
The temple rocks, the laurel waves!

The God! The God!' the Sybil cries.
Her figure swells! she foams, she raves!
Her figure swells to more than mortal size!

The crocodile.

+ So numerous were the Deities of Egypt, that, according to an ancient proverb, it was in that country less difficult to find a god than a man.

The Hieroglyphics.

The catacombs, in which the bodies of the earliest generations yet remain without corruption, by virtue of the gums that embalmed them.

reject the use of temples, highest mountains are the The elements, and more their religious reverence.

The Persians,' says Herodotus, altars, and statues. The tops of the places chosen for sacrifices." I. 131. particularly fire, were the objects of An initation of some wonderful lines in the Iliad.

Streams of rapture roll along,

Silver notes ascend the skies:

Wake, Echo, wake, and catch the song,
Oh, catch it ere it dies!

The Sybil speaks, the dream is o'er,
The holy harpings charm no more.
In vain she checks the god's control;

His madding spirit fills her frame,
And moulds the features of her soul,
Breathing a prophetic flame.

The cavern frowns; its hundred mouths unclose! And, in the thunder's voice, the fate of empire flows.

III. 1.

Mona, thy Druid rites awake the dead!
Rites thy brown oaks would never dare

Even whisper to the idle air;

Rites that have chain'd old Ocean on his bed. Shiver'd by thy piercing glance,

Pointless falls the hero's lance.

Thy magic bids the imperial eagle fly*,
And blasts the laureate wreath of victory.
Hark, the bard's soul inspires the vocal string!
At every pause dread Silence hovers o'er :
While murky Night sails round on raven wing,
Deepening the tempest's howl, the torrent's

roar;

Chased by the morn from Snowdon's awful brow, Where late she sat and scowl'd on the black wave below.

* See Tacitus, 1. xiv. c. 29.