Poems by Mr. Gray

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J. Dodsley, 1770 - 120 pages
 

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Page 119 - One morn I missed him on the customed hill, Along the heath and near his favourite tree; Another came; nor yet beside the rill, Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he; 'The next with dirges due in sad array Slow through the church-way path we saw him borne. Approach and read (for thou can'st read) the lay, Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn.
Page 25 - Th' unfeeling for his own. Yet ah ! why should they know their fate ? Since sorrow never comes too late, And happiness too swiftly flies. Thought would destroy their paradise. No more ; where ignorance is bliss, 'Tis folly to be wise.
Page 47 - This pencil take (she said) whose colours clear Richly paint the vernal year : Thine, too, these golden keys, immortal Boy ! This can unlock the gates of Joy ; Of Horror that, and thrilling Fears, Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic Tears.
Page 118 - There at the foot of yonder nodding beech, That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high, His listless length at noontide would he stretch, And pore upon the brook that babbles by.
Page 110 - Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap, Each in his narrow cell for ever laid, The rude Forefathers of the hamlet sleep.
Page 5 - O'er-canopies the glade, Beside some water's rushy brink With me the Muse shall sit, and think (At ease reclined in rustic state) How vain the ardour of the Crowd, How low, how little are the Proud, How indigent the Great ! Still is the toiling hand of Care ; The panting herds repose : Yet hark, how thro...
Page 18 - A stranger yet to pain! I feel the gales that from ye blow A momentary bliss bestow, As waving fresh their gladsome wing My weary soul they seem to soothe, And, redolent of joy and youth, To breathe a second spring.
Page 30 - Tis folly to be wise. HYMN TO ADVERSITY DAUGHTER of Jove, relentless power, Thou tamer of the human breast, Whose iron scourge and torturing hour The bad affright, afflict the best ! Bound in thy adamantine chain The proud are taught to taste of pain, And purple tyrants vainly groan With pangs unfelt before, unpitied and alone. When...
Page 46 - Where each old poetic mountain Inspiration breath'd around; Ev'ry shade and hallow'd fountain Murmur'd deep a solemn sound: Till the sad Nine in Greece's evil hour Left their Parnassus for the Latian plains. Alike they scorn the pomp of tyrantpower, And coward vice, that revels in her chains. When Latium had her lofty spirit lost, They sought, oh, Albion! next thy seaencircled coast.
Page 109 - THE curfew tolls the knell of parting day, The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea, The plowman homeward plods his weary way, And leaves the world to darkness and to me. Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, And all the air a solemn stillness holds, Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight, And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds...

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