As if the silent grove and lonely plains, The rocks around, the hanging roofs above, That charm'd me more, with native moss o'ergrown, Than Phrygian marble, or the Parian stone. I find the shades that veil'd our joys before; But, Phaon gone, the shades delight no more. 166 170 And birds defer their songs till they return: 175 With mournful Philomel I join my strain: Of Tereus she, of Phaon I complain. A spring there is, whose silver waters show, Shades all the banks, and seems itself a grove; 180 Watch'd by the sylvan genius of the place. She stood and cried, "O you that love in vain! 66 190 Fly hence, and seek the fair Leucadian main: "There stands a rock from whose impending steep "Apollo's fane surveys the rolling deep; “There injur'd lovers, leaping from above, "Their flames extinguish, and forget to love. "Deucalion once with hopeless fury burn'd, "In vain he lov'd, relentless Pyrrha scorn'd: "But when from hence he plung'd into the main, "Deucalion scorn'd, and Pyrrha lov'd in vain. 196 Haste, Sappho, haste, from high Leucadio throw "Thy wretched weight, nor dread the deeps below!'' She spoke, and vanish'd with the voice....I rise, And silent tears fall trickling from my eyes. I go, ye nymphs! these rocks and seas to prove; How much I fear, but ah, how much I love! I go, ye nymphs! where furious love inspires; Let female fears submit to female fires. 66 To rocks and seas I fly from Phaon's hate, 200 205 212 "Here she who sung to him that did inspire, "Sappho to Phoebus consecrates her lyre. 215 "What suits with Sappho, Phœbus, suits with thee; "The gift, the giver, and the god agree.” But why, alas! relentless youth, ah why To distant seas must tender Sappho fly? Thy charms than those may far more pow'rful be, And Phoebus' self is less a god to me. 221 224 Ah! canst thou doom me to the rocks and sea? 230 Untun'd my lute, and silent is my lyre; (Wretch that I am, to call that Phaon mine!) Joy to my soul, and vigour to my song: 236 Absent from thee the poet's flame expires; 240 But ah! how fiercely burns the lover's fires! And either cease to live or cease to love! 250 256 ELOISA TO ABELARD. THE ARGUMENT. Abelard and Eloisa flourished in the twelfth century: they were two of the most distinguished persons of their age in learning and beauty, but for nothing more famous than for their unfortunate passion. After a long course of calamities, they retired each to a several convent, and consecrated the remainder of their days to religion. It was many years after this separation that a letter of Abelard's to a friend, which contained the history of his misfortune, fell into the hands of Eloisa. This awakening all her tenderness, occasioned those celebrated letters (out of which the following is partly extracted) which give so lively a picture of the struggles of grace and nature, virtue and passion. P. IN these deep solitudes and awful cells, Where heav'nly-pensive Contemplation dwells, And ever-musing Melancholy reigns, What means this tumult in a vestal's veins ? |