Works

Tercentenary ode on Shakespeare read by the author at the anniversary concert, 1864.


Three centuries have passed away
Since that most famous April day,
When the sweet, gentle Will was born,...

Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation, rousting herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks; methinks I see her as an eagle, mewing her mighty youth, and kindling her endazzled eyes a...

Ants colonized it
- huge abodes littered with the dead
(leaves, sticks, the occasional granulated insect
piled high, totemic-fashion)
reaping a fortune in scenery,...

FROM THE GREEK.

Eagle! why soarest thou above that tomb?
To what sublime and star-ypaven home
Floatest thou? -
I am the image of swift Plato's spirit,
Ascending heaven; Athens doth inherit...

Cease, daubers! profane not the theme, I implore ye!
But leave him, O leave him alone with his glory!

* * * * *

Man's owl-eyed reason Popish Priests assert...

"Here learn from moral truth and wit refined,
How vice and folly have debased mankind;
Strong sense and humour arm in virtue's cause;
Thus her great votary vindicates her laws:...

'Should you e'er be unwell, send directly for me;
To cure you I'll haste with all possible speed,
Prescribe and find medicine without any fee.'
Oh! Doctor! your offer's most generous indeed;...

Still, still his bell-like voice rings through my head;
Yet not one bright thought cheers my mental view;
O! would that I were deaf, asleep, or dead!
Ye marble statues! how I envy you!
...

That sermon, reverend Sir, which you have bought,
To save your idle brain the toil of thought,
You read in such a dull, lethargic tone,
It seems almost as stupid as your own.
...

Satan, says scripture, like a roaring lion,
Goes about, seeking whom he may devour.
What should a priest, then, chiefly keep his eye on?
To guard his flock against the tempter's power....

The labourers in the vineyard toil
(So numerous are their creeds)
Far less to cultivate the soil,
Than break each others' heads.

* * * * *
...

Too long within the House has darkness dwelt,
Egyptian darkness, by the nation felt;
Therefore, though demagogues, whose deeds are ill,
For blind debate might love that darkness still,...

To purify their wine, some people bleed
A lamb into the barrel, and succeed;
No nostrum, planters say, is half so good
To make fine sugar as a negro's blood.
Now lambs and negroes both are harmless things,...

Bury, for practice bold and skill
Deserves to be of note;
He cures by means that well might kill,
He cuts his patient's throat!

* * * * *
...

Yes, every poet is a fool;
By demonstration, Ned can show it:
Happy could Ned's inverted rule
Prove every fool to be a poet.

FIRST SPEAKER, as David

I.
On the first of the Feast of Feasts,
The Dedication Day,
When the Levites joined the Priests
At the Altar in robed array,
Gave signal to sound and say,
...

BY THE DEAN. SPOKEN BY MR. GRIFFITH

Who dares affirm this is no pious age,
When charity begins to tread the stage?
When actors, who at best are hardly savers,
Will give a night of benefit to weavers?...

You've seen a pair of faithful lovers die:
And much you care; for most of you will cry,
'Twas a just judgment on their constancy.
For, heaven be thank'd, we live in such an age,...

At A Bookstore

Anno Domini 1972

A crazy bookcase, placed before
A low-price dealer's open door;
Therein arrayed in broken rows
A ragged crew of rhyme and prose,...

Perhaps the parson[1] stretch'd a point too far,
When with our Theatres he waged a war.
He tells you, that this very moral age
Received the first infection from the stage....