work_id,theme,provenance,created_at,text,reviewed_on,id,comments,metaphor,dictionary,updated_at,context
5462,Wandering,HDIS (Poetry),2003-11-10 00:00:00 UTC,"Say then, through ages by what fate confined
To different climes seem different souls assigned?
Here measured laws and philosophic ease
Fix and improve the polished arts of peace.
There Industry and Gain their vigils keep,
Command the winds and tame the unwilling deep.
Here force and hardy deeds of blood prevail;
There languid pleasure sighs in every gale.
Oft o'er the trembling nations from afar
Has Scythia breathed the living cloud of war;
And, where the deluge burst, with sweepy sway
Their arms, their kings, their gods were rolled away.
As oft have issued, host impelling host,
The blue-eyed myriads from the Baltic coast.
The prostrate south to the destroyer yields
Her boasted titles and her golden fields:
With grim delight the brood of winter view
A brighter day and heavens of azure hue,
Scent the new fragrance of the breathing rose,
And quaff the pendent vintage, as it grows.
Proud of the yoke and pliant to the rod,
Why yet does Asia dread a monarch's nod,
While European freedom still withstands
The encroaching tide, that drowns her lessening lands,
And sees far off with an indignant groan
Her native plains and empires once her own?
Can opener skies and suns of fiercer flame
O'erpower the fire that animates our frame,
As lamps, that shed at even a cheerful ray,
Fade and expire beneath the eye of day?
Need we the influence of the northern star
To string our nerves and steel our hearts to war?
And, where the face of nature laughs around,
Must sickening Virtue fly the tainted ground?
Unmanly thought! what seasons can control,
What fancied zone can circumscribe the Soul,
Who, conscious of the source from whence she springs,
By Reason's light on Resolution's wings,
Spite of her frail companion, dauntless goes
O'er Libya's deserts and through Zembla's snows?
She bids each slumbering energy awake,
Another touch, another temper take,
Suspends the inferior laws that rule our clay:
The stubborn elements confess her sway;
Their little wants, their low desires, refine,
And raise the mortal to a height divine.
(ll. 38-83 p. 95-8)",,14609,"•I've included thrice: Wandering, Light, and Wings","""What fancied zone can circumscribe the Soul, / Who, conscious of the source from whence she springs, / By Reason's light on Resolution's wings, / Spite of her frail / companion, dauntless goes / O'er Libya's deserts and through Zembla's snows? ""","",2013-06-04 16:40:41 UTC,""
5485,"",Reading,2003-07-28 00:00:00 UTC,"To doggerel now I turn my pen:
A time may come (but lord knows when)
That I may try to think again.
At present in my brain there floats
A thousand parti-colored motes;
From which, if time would but permit,
I might sift some sparks of wit;
And many a line in verse and prose
Are lost, whilst half-asleep I doze.
My pineal gland could you but view,
You'd scarce believe your eyes see true:
There's such a jumble; good and bad,
All sorts of thoughts, may there be had;
Like broker's shop, where we may find
Goods that belong to half mankind;
Which, should the master dare produce,
Are little worth, and out of use;
And joy could sparkle in his face,
Could he put better in their place.
Thus oft, from shop of brain, I try
To throw the dirt and rubbish by;
But still they gain their former state,
Or leave a vacuum in the pate.
(ll. 1-23, p. 346 in Lonsdale edition)",2003-10-23,14689,•More follows in the lines below. See next entry
•Some loose (FID-like) representations of thought follow in the next stanzas.
•Cross Reference: the Pythagorean idea of the soul?!,"""At present in my brain there floats / A thousand parti-colored motes; / From which, if time would but permit, / I might sift some sparks of wit.""","",2013-11-11 22:32:53 UTC,""
5532,"","",2004-06-22 00:00:00 UTC,"TO SILVIA
My lovely Silvia, while in blooming youth
Your mental powers are active, sprightly, gay,
Attend the voice of friendship and of truth,
That courts your notice in the moral lay.
Those active powers the Lord of nature gave
To reason's rule by choice alone confin'd,
For reason's empire never knew a slave,
Her sway is gentle and her laws are kind.
Her subjects take their orders from her eye,
While she to each their various task assigns;
And now o'er nature's ample field they fly,
A field far richer than Peruvian mines.
Here with unweary'd diligence they rove,
Collecting treasures to enrich the mind:
And many a flower and plant in dale or grove,
Of virtues rare and fadeless bloom they find.
And now with treasures fraught returning home,
Before their queen display the shining spoil,
Arrang'd in beauteous order round the dome,
Her approbation crowns the pleasing toil.
When chill'd by time's cold hand, those sprightly powers
Inclin'd to rest, inactive, cease to roam,
Those mental stores shall cheer the wintery hours,
And flowers unfading breathe their sweets at home.
Extracting food amid the vernal bloom,
So flies the industrious bee around the vale,
With native skill she forms the waxen comb,
To keep for wintery days the rich regale.
",,14799,"•INTEREST. Rich Poem. There is an extended allegory here that picks up form the previous metaphors. Reason's rule, working subjects, mining, flowers, treasures, storage, etc.
•I've included this entry thrice: Government, Minerals, Animals.
•The whole is then brought into comparison with the honey bee!","Reason's subjects work and return home with ""treasures fraught"" and display before their queen their ""shining spoils, which are laid up in ""mental stores.""",Coinage and Rooms,2013-06-11 18:37:16 UTC,I've included the entire poem
5614,"","Reading; found again searching ""mirror"" and ""mind in HDIS (Poetry); and again in ECCO-TCP",2003-12-17 00:00:00 UTC,"There is a pleasure in poetic pains
Which only poets know. The shifts and turns,
The expedients and inventions multiform
To which the mind resorts, in chase of terms
Though apt, yet coy, and difficult to win,--
To arrest the fleeting images that fill
The mirror of the mind, and hold them fast,
And force them sit, till he has pencil'd off
A faithful likeness of the forms he views;
Then to dispose his copies with such art
That each may find its most propitious light,
And shine by situation, hardly less
Than by the labour and the skill it cost,
Are occupations of the poet's mind
So pleasing, and that steal away the thought
With such address, from themes of sad import,
That lost in his own musings, happy man!
He feels the anxieties of life, denied
Their wonted entertainment, all retire.
Such joys has he that sings. But ah! not such,
Or seldom such, the hearers of his song.
Fastidious, or else listless, or perhaps
Aware of nothing arduous in a task
They never undertook, they little note
His dangers or escapes, and haply find
There least amusement where he found the most.
But is amusement all? studious of song,
And yet ambitious not to sing in vain,
I would not trifle merely, though the world
Be loudest in their praise who do no more.
Yet what can satire, whether grave or gay?
It may correct a foible, may chastise
The freaks of fashion, regulate the dress,
Retrench a sword-blade, or displace a patch;
But where are its sublimer trophies found?
What vice has it subdued? whose heart reclaim'd
By rigour, or whom laugh'd into reform?
Alas! Leviathan is not so tamed.
Laugh'd at, he laughs again; and stricken hard,
Turns to the stroke his adamantine scales,
That fear no discipline of human hands.
(Bk. II, ll. 285-325, pp. 146-7)",,15004,"","""The shifts and turns, / The expedients and inventions multiform / To which the mind resorts, in chase of terms / Though apt, yet coy, and difficult to win,-- / To arrest the fleeting images that fill / The mirror of the mind, and hold them fast, / And force them sit, till he has pencil'd off / A faithful likeness of the forms he views.""",Mirror,2013-08-22 21:11:58 UTC,""
5658,"","Searching ""ball"" in HDIS (Poetry)",2011-09-13 19:49:23 UTC,"But, alas! who can hope to be wise as they ought,
When the evils of life taint the progress of thought?
Like a snow-ball, the mind, fraught with peace in its prime,
Moves swiftly adown the steep shelvings of Time;
Accumulates filth from Society's sons,
And strengthens and hardens its coat as it runs;
Till habit on habit is negligent laid,
And the object appears motley, vile, and ill-made;
At last, when its indirect wanderings are o'er,
And the sated despoiler can gather no more,
The form lies repos'd at the base of the hill,
A globular concrete of good and of ill;
As its worth has been mix'd with the radix of woe,
And the dirt of the valley has sullied the snow.
(Third Part, Mrs. Pope, pp. 202-3, ll. 423-436) ",,19154,Crazy simile! INTEREST,"""Like a snow-ball, the mind, fraught with peace in its prime, / Moves swiftly adown the steep shelvings of Time; / Accumulates filth from Society's sons, / And strengthens and hardens its coat as it runs; / Till habit on habit is negligent laid, / And the object appears motley, vile, and ill-made; / At last, when its indirect wanderings are o'er, / And the sated despoiler can gather no more, / The form lies repos'd at the base of the hill, / A globular concrete of good and of ill; / As its worth has been mix'd with the radix of woe, / And the dirt of the valley has sullied the snow.""",Introduction,2014-03-14 14:50:16 UTC,"Third Part, Mrs. Pope"
5343,"",Reading,2013-10-28 02:40:16 UTC,"Such is the girl, love nestling in her eye,
In vain she strives, love gives her tongue the lye;
Melting like dripping at the Bedford fire,
She seeks the Park to quench the fierce desire:
Chooses the shadiest part, grows sick of light,
And every moment seems an age to night:
By passions torn, by prudence check'd she roves,
Now firm to yield, and now she flies the groves:
Resolv'd to speak, she stops, shame warms her cheek,
She won't, she will, she can, she cannot speak:
Amidst these conflicts Me---d---t appears,
The smoothest, greyest villain of his years;
With sugar'd speeches moves the doubtful part,
And conquer'd Kitty, sighs beneath the smart.
Passions, and snow balls each by motion swell,
And Kitty finds her little heart rebel;
Full of desires she sighs for this, and that,
Her heart for ev'ry man goes pit-a-pat;
Thus by degrees she steps upon the Town,
And what's so common pray, as Kitty Brown?
(ll. 151-170)",,23086,"","""Passions, and snow balls each by motion swell, / And Kitty finds her little heart rebel; / Full of desires she sighs for this, and that, / Her heart for ev'ry man goes pit-a-pat.""","",2013-10-28 02:40:16 UTC,""
7984,"",Reading,2014-07-25 18:21:30 UTC,"Whoever thinks must see that man was made
To face the storm, not languish in the shade;
Action's his sphere, and,for that sphere design'd,
Eternal pleasures open on his mind.
For this, fair hope leads on the' impassion'd soul
Through life's wild labyrinths to her distant goal;
Paints in each dream, to fan the genial flame,
The pomp of riches, and the pride of fame,
Or fondly gives reflection's cooler eye
A glance, an image, of a future sky.
Yet, though kind Heaven points out the' unerring road
That leads through nature up to bliss and God;
Spite of that God, and all his voice divine
Speaks in the heart, or teaches from the shrine,
Man, feebly vain, and impotently wise,
Disdains the manna sent him from the skies;
Tasteless of all that virtue gives to please,
For thought too active, and too mad for ease,
From wish to wish in life's mad vortex toss'd,
For ever struggling, and for ever lost;
He scorns religion, though her seraphs call,
And lives in rapture, or not lives at all.
(pp. 154-155)",,24303,"","""Tasteless of all that virtue gives to please, / For thought too active, and too mad for ease, / From wish to wish in life's mad vortex toss'd, / For ever struggling, and for ever lost; / He scorns religion, though her seraphs call, / And lives in rapture, or not lives at all.""","",2014-07-25 18:21:30 UTC,""