Chapter 73
How hard their lot who neither won nor lost.
CHARLES CHURCHILL.
1741-1764.
_The Rosciad_. Line 861.
But spite of all the criticising elves, Those who would make us feel--must feel themselves.
MRS. THEALE.
1740-1822.
_Three Warnings_.
The tree of deepest root is found Least willing still to quit the ground; 'Twas therefore said, by ancient sages, That love of life increased with years So much, that in our latter stages, When pains grow sharp, and sickness rages, The greatest love of life appears.
WILLIAM COWPER.
1731-1800.
THE TASK.
Book i. _The Sofa_.
G.o.d made the county, and man made the town.[20]
[Note 20: "G.o.d the first garden made, and the first city Cain."--Cowley]
Book ii. _The Timepiece_.
O for a lodge in some vast wilderness, Some boundless contiguity of shade, Where rumor of oppression and deceit, Of unsuccessful or successful war, Might never roach me more.
Mountains interposed Make enemies of nations, who had else, Like kindred drops, been mingled into one.
England, with all thy faults, I love thee still.
Praise enough To fill the ambition of a private man, That Chatham's language was his mother tongue.
There is a pleasure in poetic pains Which only poets know.
Variety's the very spice of life, That gives it all its flavor.
Book iii. _The Garden_.
Domestic Happiness, thou only bliss Of Paradise that hast survived the fall!
How various his employments whom the world jails idle; and who justly in return Esteems that busy world an idler too!
Book iv. _Winter Evening_.
And while the bubbling and loud hissing urn Throws up a steamy column, and the cups That cheer, but not inebriate, wait on each, So let us welcome peaceful evening in.
'Tis pleasant, through the loopholes of retreat, To peep at such a world; to see the stir Of the great Babel, and not feel the crowd.
Book v. _Winter Morn in a Walk_.
He is the freeman whom the truth makes free.
Book vi. _Winter Walk at Noon_.