THE earth was formed, but in the womb as yet
Of waters, embryon immature involved,
Appeared not over all the face of earth
Main ocean flowed, not idle, but with warm
Prolific humour softening all her globe,
Fermented the great mother to conceive,
Satiate with genial moisture, when God said,
Be gathered now, ye waters under heaven,
Into one place, and let dry land appear.
Immediately the mountains huge appear
Emergent, and their broad bare backs upheave
Into the clouds: their tops ascend the sky.
So high as heaved the tumid hills, so low
Down sunk a hollow bottom broad and deep,
Capacious bed of waters: thither they
Hasted with glad precipitance, uprolled
As drops on dust conglobing from the dry:
Part rise in crystal wall, or ridge direct,
For haste; such flight the great command impressed
On the swift floods. As armies at the call
Of trumpet (for of armies thou hast heard)
Troop to their standard, so the watery throng,
Wave rolling after wave, where way they found,
If steep, with torrent rapture, if through plain,
Soft ebbing; nor withstood them rock or hill,
But they, or under ground, or circuit wide
With serpent error wandering, found their way,
And on the washy ooze deep channels wore,
Easy, ere God had bid the ground be dry,
All but within those banks, where rivers now
Stream, and perpetual draw their humid train.
The dry land earth, and the great receptacle
Of congregated waters he called seas:
And saw that it was good.
AT length I look on thee again,
Abyss of azure! thou vast main,
Long by my verse implored in vain,
Alone inspired by thee!
The magic of thy sounds alone
Can raise the transports I have known;
My harp is mute, unless its tone
Be waked beside the Sea.
The heights of Blanc have fired mine eyes,——
Those three bare mounts that touch the skies;
I loved the terror of their brow,
I loved their diadem of snow,—
But, O thou wild and awful Sea,
More dear to me
Thy threatening, drear immensity!
Dread Ocean! burst upon me with thy shores! Fling wide thy waters where the storms bear sway!
Thy bosom opens to a thousand prores:
Yet fleets, with idle daring, breast thy spray,-Ripple with arrow's track thy closing plain, And graze the surface of thy deep domain.
Man dares not tread thy liquid way;
Thou spurn'st that despot of a day,
Tossed like a snow-flake, or the spray
From storm-gulfs to the skies:
He breathes and reigns on solid land,
And ruins mark his tyrant hand;
Thou bidd'st him in that circle stand,
Thy reign his rage defies.
Or should he force his passage there,
Thou risest, mocking his despair;
The shipwreck humbles all his pride:
He sinks within the darksome tide,---
The surge's vast unfathomed gloom
His catacomb,-
Without a name, without a tomb.
Thy banks are kingdoms, where the shrine, the throne,
The pomp of human things, are changed and past: The people, they were phantoms,—they are flown; Time has avenged thee on their strength at last : Thy billows idly rest on Sidon's shore,
And her bold pilots wound thy pride no more.
Rome, Athens,-Carthage, what are they?
Spoiled heritage, successive prey;
New nations force their onward way,
And grasp disputed reign.
Thou changest not; thy waters pour
The same wild waves against the shore,
Where liberty had breathed before,
And slavery hugs his chain.
States bow; Time's sceptre presses still
On Appenine's subsiding hill;
The steps of ages crumbling slow,
Are stamped upon his arid brow:
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