Thus let us leave the bower of love, Our hearts have suffered little harm My kisses have not stained the rose Farewell! and when some other fair Her spells with your remembered charms. "This cheek,' I'll say, is not so bright As one that used to meet my kiss; This eye has not such liquid light As one that used to talk of bliss!' Farewell! and when some future lover All the charms that once were mine; I think I should be sweetly blest, EPISTLES, ODES, AND OTHER POEMS. 1806. TO FRANCIS, EARL OF MOIRA, GENERAL IN HIS MAJESTY'S FORCES, MASTER-GENERAL OF THE ORDNANCE, CONSTABLE OF THE TOWER, ETC. In a MY LORD,It is impossible to think of addressing a Dedication to your Lordship without calling to mind the well-known reply of the Spartan to a rhetorician who proposed to pronounce an eulogium on Hercules. On Hercules!' said the honest Spartan, who ever thought of blaming Hercules?' similar manner, the concurrence of public opinion has left to the panegyrist of your Lordship a very superfluous task. I shall therefore be silent on the subject, and merely entreat your indulgence to the very humble tribute of gratitude which I have here the honour to present. I am, my Lord, With every feeling of attachment and respect, Your Lordship's very devoted servan 27, Bury Street, St. James's, April 10, 1806. THOMAS MOORE. PREFACE. THE principal poems in the following Collection were written during an absence of fourteen months from Europe. Though curiosity was certainly not the motive of my voyage to America, yet it happened that the gratification of curiosity was the only advantage which I derived from it. Finding myself in the country of a new people, whose infancy had promised so much, and whose progress to maturity has been an object of such interesting speculation, I determined to employ the short period of time, which my plan of return to Europe afforded me, in travelling through a few of the States, and acquiring some knowledge of the inhabitants. The impression which my mind received from the character and manners of these republicans, suggested the Epistles which are written from the city of Washington and Lake Erie. How far I was right, in thus assuming the bone of a satirist against a people whom I viewed but as a stranger and a visitor, is a doubt which my feelings did not allow me time to investigate. All I presume to answer for is the fidelity of the picture which I have given; and 'Epistles VI., VII., and VIII. though prudence might have dictated gentler language, truth, I think, would have justified severer. I went to America with prepossessions by no means unfavourable, and, indeed, rather indulged in many of those illusive ideas with respect to the purity of the government, and the primitive happiness of the people, which I had early imbibed in my native country, where, unfortunately, discontent at home enhances every distant temptation, and the Western world has long been looked to as a retreat from real or imaginary oppression, as the elysian Atlantis, where persecuted patriots might find their visions realized, and be welcomed by kindred spirits to liberty and repose. I was completely disappointed in every flattering expectation which I had formed, and was inclined to say to America, as Horace says to his mistress, 'intentata nites.' Brissot, in the preface to his Travels, observes, that 'freedom in that country is carried to so high a degree as to border upon a state of nature;' and there certainly is a close approximation to savage life, not only in the liberty which they enjoy, but in the violence of party spirit and of private animosity which results from it. This illiberal zeal embitters all social intercourse; and though I scarcely could hesitate in selecting the party whose views appeared the more pure and rational, yet I was sorry to observe that, in asserting their opinions, they both assume an equal share of intolerance; the Democrats, consistently with their principles, exhibiting a vulgarity of rancour which the Federalists too often are so forgetful of their cause as to imitate. The rude familiarity of the lower orders, and, indeed, the unpolished state of society in general, would neither surprise nor disgust if they seemed to flow from that simplicity of character, that honest ignorance of the gloss of refinement, which may be looked for in a new and inexperienced people. But when we find them arrived at maturity in most of the vices and all the pride of civilization, while they are still so remote from its elegant characteristics, it is impossible not to feel that this youthful decay, this crude anticipation of the natural period of corruption, represses every sanguine hope of the future energy and greatness of America. I am conscious that, in venturing these few remarks, I have said just enough to offend, and by no means sufficient to convince; for the limits of a preface will not allow me to enter into a justification of my opinions, and I am committed on the subject as effectually as if I had written volumes in their defence. My reader, however, is apprised of the very cursory observation upon which these opinions are founded, and can easily decide for himself upon the degree of attention or confidence which they merit. With respect to the poems in general which occupy the following pages, I know not in what manner to apologize to the public for intruding upon their notice such a mass of unconnected trifles, such a world of epicurean atoms, as I have here brought in conflict together. To say that I have been tempted by the liberal offers of my bookseller, is an excuse which can hope for but little indulgence from the critic; yet I own that, without this seasonable inducement, these poems very possibly would never have been submitted to the world. The glare of publication is too strong for such imperfect productions. they should be shown but to the eye of friendship, in that dim light of privacy, which is as favourable to poetical as to female beauty, and serves as a veil for faults, while it enhances every charm which it displays. Besides, this is not a period for the idle occupations of poetry, and times like the present require talents more active and more useful. Few have now the leisure to read such trifles, and I sincerely regret that I have had the leisure to write them. EPISTLES, ODES, AND OTHER POEMS. EPISTLE I. TO LORD VISCOUNT STRANGFORD. ABOARD THE PHAETON FRIGATE, OFF THE AZORES, BY MOONLIGHT. By any spell my hand could dare To make thy disk its ample page, And write my thoughts, my wishes there; How many a friend, whose careless eye Now wanders o'er that starry sky, Should smile, upon thy orb to meet Oh, Strangford! when we parted last, To turn to rapture all we knew! When, mingling lore and laugh together, And turned the leaf with folly's feather! And yet 'twas time-in youthful days, The spring will dry, the heart will freeze! 1 Pythagoras, who was supposed to have a power of writing upon the moon by the means of a magic mirror. See Bayle, art. Pythag. And then, that Hope, that fairy Hope, When flying from the Phrygian shore, Pursues the murmurs of the deep, I often think, if friends were near, And o'er its calm the vessel glides The slumber of the silent tides ! 2 Hath hung its shade on Pico's height, Now, could I range those verdant isles And see the looks, the melting smiles, And could I lift each pious veil, And see the blushing cheek it shades, Dear Strangford ! at this hour, perhaps, And gave, all glowing warm, to thine! Alluding to these animated lines in the 44th It is said by some to be as high as the peak of Carmen of this poet (Catullus): Jam mens pratrepidans avet vagari, Teneriffe. 3 I believe it is Guthrie who says, that the inhabitants of the Azores are much addicted to gallantry. This is an assertion in which even Azores, from which the island derives its name.. Pico is a very high mountain on one of the Guthrie may be credited. These islands belong to the Portuguese. |