work_id,theme,provenance,created_at,text,reviewed_on,id,comments,metaphor,dictionary,updated_at,context
3834,"",Searching in HDIS (Poetry),2004-08-10 00:00:00 UTC,"This Heart of mine, now wreck'd upon despair,
Was once as free and careless as the Air;
In th' early Morning of my tender years,
E're I was sensible of Hopes and Fears,
It floated in a Sea of Mirth and Ease,
And thought the World was only made to please;
No adverse Wind had ever stopp'd its Course,
Nor had it felt great Love's tempestuous Force,
(That Storm that swells the Tydes of Human Care,
And makes black Waves come rolling from afar,)
'Till too much Freedom made it grow secure,
As if the Sunshine always would endure;
And I, with haughty and disdainful Pride,
Mock'd the blind God, and all his Force defy'd.
At this enrag'd, the injur'd Deity
Chose out the best of his Artillery,
And in a blooming Virgin's Dove-like Eyes
He planted his Victorious Batteries;
(Phillis her Name, the best of Woman-kind,
Could Love have gain'd the Empire of her Mind)
These shot so furiously against my Heart,
That Nature's strength, tho' much improv'd by Art,
With Groans gave way to each resistless stroak,
As when the Thunder rends some sturdy Oak.
The wing'd Battalions from her lovely face
Flew to the Breach, and, rushing in apace,
Did quickly make her Mistress of the place.
",,9866,"","""This Heart of mine, now wreck'd upon despair, / Was once as free and careless as the Air; / In th' early Morning of my tender years, / E're I was sensible of Hopes and Fears, / It floated in a Sea of Mirth and Ease, / And thought the World was only made to please; / No adverse Wind had ever stopp'd its Course, / Nor had it felt great Love's tempestuous Force, / (That Storm that swells the Tydes of Human Care, / And makes black Waves come rolling from afar,) / 'Till too much Freedom made it grow secure, / As if the Sunshine always would endure; / And I, with haughty and disdainful Pride, / Mock'd the blind God, and all his Force defy'd.""","",2018-06-18 15:32:17 UTC,""
4171,Microcosm,Searching in HDIS (Poetry),2006-01-18 00:00:00 UTC,"Causes remote from our Observance fly,
We have a nobler Object always nigh;
Man, lordly Creature! in whom Beauties meet,
Unnumber'd, and the lovely Frame complete.
Mark the nice Structure, and the wond'rous Art;
How just the whole, how curious ev'ry part.
By the Child's Features we the Parent guess,
And Looks divine an heav'nly Sire confess.
Man amiably Majestick Walks erect,
And from th'inferiour World commands Respect;
Reason curbs Force, and gives to Fury Laws,
And fiercest Creatures to Subjection Aws.
They conscious yield, and own the righteous Sway,
And their just Sovereign passively obey.
Man is the Universe, in little shown,
The scatter'd Beauties here are joyn'd in one,
In him the several Motions are explain'd,
And the great World is in the less contain'd.
For as th'Almighty's Throne is fix'd on high,
(Far from these lower Spheres, and arched Sky)
Where Seraphs, and Cherubic Orders stand,
Attend the Nod, and wait the blest Command;
Then with Angelic Motion swift obey,
And instantly themselves to farthest Worlds convey.
Thus seated in the Brain the reasoning Soul
Exalted sits, and there directs the whole.
At the least Hint the conscious Spirits start;
Loaden with Images from ev'ry part
In branched Tubes the subtle Atoms rome,
And from each Sense bring fresh Advices home.
The Immaterial Mind attends above,
While they inform how outward Objects move.
The God of Light sends down his streaming Rays
On the warm'd Earth, and chears with smiling Days.
And thus the central Heart the Source contains
Of vital Heat, and in its Cavern strains
The bubling Streams, that stretch the swelling Veins.
Still it conveys the swift returning Blood,
And restless thus maintains the circling Flood.
The Sun (when Summer-heats the Spring succeed)
Changes the tarnish'd Verdure of the Mead:
The dry'd up Rills no longer murmuring creep
O'er the smooth Pebbles, and invite to sleep,
But buzzing Insects make an uncouth Noise,
And sulph'rous Vapours thunder in the Skies.
So when the Heart tumultuous Passions move,
If melting in the softer Flames of Love
With quicker Strokes the hasty Pulses beat,
And glowing Cheeks confess the inward Heat:
Or if fierce Rage provoke, and vengeful Ire,
The Eyes then sparkle with unusual Fire:
Ah! soon the Flames their rapid Fury spread,
And colour all with a malignant Red.
Curses and Oaths th'unthinking Wretch repeats,
And the Tongue faulters in half-utter'd Threats.
How like the Earth mix'd with the watry Mass,
Where troubled Seas the slimy Land embrace,
Are Man's less noble Parts, th'inferiour Drain,
Where forc'd the cruder Sediments remain?
Here stagnate Filth, and Acid worthless Lees,
And noisom Heaps from various Foods encrease.
Hence windy Fumes, and sudden Vapours spread,
That swell the Breast, and rack the aching Head,
Till forc'd by stronger Nature to retreat,
They melting fall, and all dissolve in Sweat:
Dispers'd in watry Drops they pain no more,
But work insensibly thro' ev'ry Pore.
And as the Sun by his own Heat exhales
Clouds from the Sea, and Fogs from marshy Vales;
Which (tho' base-born) ambitious higher move,
Prevent the Light, and hide the Worlds above.
So from corporeal Dregs the Mists condense,
And intercept the Messengers of Sense.
Hence the clog'd Spirits their Confinement mourn,
And Reason waits in vain the swift Return.
The clouded Images their March delay,
Till the rouz'd Soul, by a superiour Ray
Breaks thro' the Shade, and urges on the Day.",,10819,•I've included twice: Seasons and Mead
•Rich Passage. REVISIT. — A failed comparison?,"""The Sun (when Summer-heats the Spring succeed) / Changes the tarnish'd Verdure of the Mead: / The dry'd up Rills no longer murmuring creep / O'er the smooth Pebbles, and invite to sleep, / But buzzing Insects make an uncouth Noise, / And sulph'rous Vapours thunder in the Skies. / So when the Heart tumultuous Passions move, / If melting in the softer Flames of Love / With quicker Strokes the hasty Pulses beat, / And glowing Cheeks confess the inward Heat.""","",2013-06-04 20:56:30 UTC,""
4529,Stream of Consciousness,"Reading and searching in HDIS (Poetry). See also Patricia Meyer Spacks, An Argument of Images: The Poetry of Alexander Pope (Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1971), 3.
",2003-11-04 00:00:00 UTC,"Our Depths who fathoms, or our Shallows finds?
Quick Whirls, and shifting Eddies, of our minds?
Life's stream for observation will not stay,
It hurries all too fast to mark their way :
In vain sedate reflections we would make,
When half our knowledge we must snatch, not take.
On human actions reason tho' you can,
It may be Reason, but it is not Man;
His Principle of action once explore,
That instant, 'tis his principle no more;
Like following life thro' Creatures you dissect,
You lose it, in the moment you detect.
(ll. 29-40)",,11907,"•Great candidate for early figuration of the stream of consciousness.
•Lines below suggest Montaigne's essay on Man's inconstancy, which Pope called ""the best in his whole book."" For a brief discussion of Pope, Montaigne, and Pyrrhonism see Rebecca Ferguson's The Unbalanced Mind (104).","""Our Depths who fathoms, or our Shallows finds? / Quick Whirls, and shifting Eddies, of our minds?""","",2017-03-08 19:43:38 UTC,""
4532,"",HDIS (Poetry),2004-08-26 00:00:00 UTC," My frame of nature is a ruffled sea,
And my disease the tempest. Nature feels
A strange commotion to her inmost centre;
The throne of reason shakes. 'Be still, my thoughts;
'Peace and be still.' In vain my reason gives
The peaceful word, my spirit strives in vain
To calm the tumult and command my thoughts.
This flesh, this circling blood, these brutal powers,
Made to obey, turn rebels to the mind,
Nor hear its laws. The engine rules the man.
Unhappy change! When nature's meaner springs,
Fir'd to impetuous ferments, break all order;
When little restless atoms rise and reign
Tyrants in sov'reign uproar, and impose
Ideas on the mind; confus'd ideas
Of non-existents and impossibles,
Who can describe them? Fragments of old dreams,
Borrow'd from midnight, torn from fairy fields
And fairy skies, and regions of the dead,
Abrupt, ill-sorted! O 'tis all confusion!
If I but close my eyes, strange images
In thousand forms and thousand colours rise,
Stars, rainbows, moons, green dragons, bears and ghosts,
An endless medley rush upon the stage,
And dance and riot wild in reason's court
Above control. I'm in a raging storm,
Where seas and skies are blended, while my soul
Like some light worthless chip of floating cork
Is tost from wave to wave: Now overwhelm'd
With breaking floods, I drown, and seem to lose
All being: Now high-mounted on the ridge
Of a tall foaming surge, I'm all at once
Caught up into the storm, and ride the wind,
The whistling wind; unmanageable steed,
And feeble rider! Hurried many a league
Over the rising hills of roaring brine,
Thro' airy wilds unknown, with dreadful speed
And infinite surprise; till some few minutes
Have spent the blast, and then perhaps I drop
Near to the peaceful coast; some friendly billow
Lodges me on the beach, and I find rest:
Short rest I find; for the next rolling wave
Snatches me back again; then ebbing far
Sets me adrift, and I am borne off to sea,
Helpless, amidst the bluster of the winds,
Beyond the ken of shore.
",2011-09-07,11924,"•I've included thrice: Tempest, Waves, Cork","""I'm in a raging storm, / Where seas and skies are blended, while my soul / Like some light worthless chip of floating cork / Is tost from wave to wave.""","",2011-09-07 19:34:50 UTC,""
4569,"",Searching in HDIS (Poetry),2004-06-17 00:00:00 UTC,"Such in her self is Reason--: Deist say,
What hast thou here t'object, t'explain away?
Think'st thou thy Reason this unerring Rule?
Then live a madman--and yet die a fool!
God gave us Reason as the Stars were giv'n,
Not to discard the Sun, but mark out Heav'n;
At once a Rule of Faith, if well imploy'd,
A Source of Pleasure, if arright enjoy'd,
And Point, round which th'eternal error lies
Of fools too credulous, and wits too wise;
A faithful guide to comfort and to save,
Till the mind floats, like Peter on the wave:
Then bright-ey'd Hope descends, of heav'nly birth,
And Faith, our Immortality on Earth,
A Saviour speaks! lo darkness low'rs no more,
And the husht billows sleep against the shore.
If This be hardship let the dying heir
Spurn back his father's aid, and curse his care?
If this be cruel, partial, or unwise,
Then perish infidel, and God despise!",,12012,"","""God gave us Reason ... A faithful guide to comfort and to save, / Till the mind floats, like Peter on the wave.""","",2018-06-18 15:04:40 UTC,""
4814,"","",2004-06-15 00:00:00 UTC,"A peevish Boy shall proffer'd Fruit despise;
""Take it, dear Puppy."" No, and yet he dies
If you refuse it. Does not this discover
The froward Soul of a discarded Lover,
Thus reasoning with himself? What! when thus slighted
Shall I return, return though uninvited?
Yes, he shall sure return and lingering wait
At the proud Doors he now presumes to hate.
""Shall I not go if she submissive send,
""Or here resolve, my Injuries shall end?
""Expell'd, recall'd, shall I go back again?
""No; let her kneel; for she shall kneel in vain.""
When lo! his wily Servant well reply'd,
Think not by Rule and Reason, Sir, to guide
What ne'er by Reason or by Measure move,
For Peace and War succeed by Turns in Love,
And while tempestuous these Emotions roll,
And float with blind Disorder in the Soul,
Who strives to fix them by one certain Rule,
May by right Rule and Reason play the Fool.",,12869,•Cross-reference: see the translation of these lines in Duncombe's Horace.,"""For Peace and War succeed by Turns in Love, / And while tempestuous these Emotions roll, / And float with blind Disorder in the Soul.""","",2013-07-16 22:19:41 UTC,"Book II, Satire iii"
7399,"",Reading,2013-06-05 19:41:01 UTC,"Yet man (fool man!) here buries all his thoughts;
Inters celestial hopes without one sigh;
Prisoner of earth, and pent beneath the moon,
Here pinions all his wishes; wing'd by Heaven
To fly at infinite; and reach it there
Where seraphs gather immortality,
On life's fair tree, fast by the throne of God.
What golden joys ambrosial clustering glow
In His full beam, and ripen for the just,
Where momentary ages are no more!
Where Time, and Pain, and Chance, and Death expire!
And is it in the flight of threescore years
To push eternity from human thought,
And smother souls immortal in the dust?
A soul immortal, spending all her fires,
Wasting her strength in strenuous idleness,
Thrown into tumult, raptured, or alarm'd,
At aught this scene can threaten, or indulge,
Resembles ocean into tempest wrought,
To waft a feather, or to drown a fly.
(ll. 135-154, pp. 40-1 in CUP edition)",,20389,"","""A soul immortal, spending all her fires, / Wasting her strength in strenuous idleness, / Thrown into tumult, raptured, or alarm'd, / At aught this scene can threaten, or indulge, / Resembles ocean into tempest wrought, / To waft a feather, or to drown a fly.""","",2013-06-05 19:41:01 UTC,Night the First
7408,"",Reading,2013-06-11 16:04:58 UTC,"Mark well, as foreign as these subjects seem,
What close connexion ties them to my theme.
First, what is true ambition? The pursuit
Of glory, nothing less than man can share.
Were they as vain as gaudy-minded man,
As flatulent with fumes of self-applause,
Their arts and conquests animals might boast,
And claim their laurel crowns as well as we;
But not celestial. Here we stand alone;
As in our form, distinct, pre-eminent:
If prone in thought, our stature is our shame,
And man should blush his forehead meets the skies.
The Visible and Present are for brutes,
A slender portion, and a narrow bound!
These Reason, with an energy Divine,
O'erleaps, and claims the Future and Unseen;
The vast Unseen, the Future fathomless!
When the great soul buoys up to this high point,
Leaving gross Nature's sediments below,
Then, and then only, Adam's offspring quits
The sage and hero of the fields and woods,
Asserts his rank, and rises into man.
This is ambition: this is human fire.
(ll. 234-256, p. 155 in CUP edition)",,20513,"","""These Reason, with an energy Divine, / O'erleaps, and claims the Future and Unseen; / The vast Unseen, the Future fathomless! / When the great soul buoys up to this high point, / Leaving gross Nature's sediments below, / Then, and then only, Adam's offspring quits / The sage and hero of the fields and woods, / Asserts his rank, and rises into man.""","",2013-06-11 16:04:58 UTC,Night the Sixth
4393,"","",2013-06-20 19:53:45 UTC,"AND let th' aspiring Youth beware of Love,
And shun th' enchanting Glance, for 'tis too late
When on his Heart the Torrent Softness pours.
Then Interest sinks to Dirt, and distant Fame
Dissolves in Air away. While the fond Soul
Is wrapt in Dreams of Ecstacy, and Bliss;
Still paints th' illusive Form, the kindling Grace,
Th' alluring Smile, the full aethereal Eye
Effusing Heaven; and listens ardent still
To the small Voice, where Harmony and Wit,
A modest, melting, mingled Sweetness, flow.
No sooner is the fair Idea form'd,
And Contemplation fixes on the Theme,
Than from his own Creation wild He flies,
Sick of a Shadow. Absence comes apace,
And shoots his every Pang into his Breast.
'Tis nought but Gloom around. The darken'd Sun
Loses his Light. The rosy-bosom'd Spring
To weeping Fancy pines; and yon bright Arch
Of Heaven low-bends into a dusky Vault.
All Nature fades extinct; and She alone
Heard, felt, and seen, possesses every Thought,
Fills every Sense, and pants in every Vein.
Books are but formal Dulness, tedious Friends,
And sad amid the Social Band he sits,
Lonely, and inattentive. From the Tongue
Th' unfinish'd Period falls: while, born away
On swelling Thought, his wafted Spirit flies
To the dear Bosom of his absent Fair;
And leaves the Semblance of a Lover, fix'd
In melancholy Site, with Head declin'd,
And Love-dejected Eyes. Sudden he starts,
Shook from his tender Trance, and restless runs
To glimmering Shades, and sympathetic Glooms,
Where the dun Umbrage o'er the falling Stream
Romantic hangs; there thro' the pensive Dusk
Strays, in Heart-thrilling Meditation lost,
Indulging all to Love: or on the Bank
Thrown, amid drooping Lillies, swells the Breeze
With Sighs unceasing, and the Brook with Tears.
Thus in soft Anguish he consumes the Day;
Nor quits his deep Retirement, till the Moon
Peeps thro' the Chambers of the fleecy East,
Enlighten'd by Degrees, and in her Train
Leads on the gentle Hours; then forth He walks,
Beneath the trembling Languish of her Beams,
With soften'd Soul, and wooes the Bird of Eve
To mingle Woes with his: or while the World,
And all the Sons of Care lie hush'd in Sleep,
Associates with the Mid-night Shadows drear,
And, sighing to the lonely Taper, pours
His sweetly-tortur'd Heart into the Page
Meant for the moving Messenger of Love.
But ah how faint, how meaningless, and poor
To what his Passion swells! which bursts the Bounds
Of every Eloquence, and asks for Looks,
Where Fondness flows on Fondness, Love on Love;
Entwisting Beams with Her's, and speaking more
Than ever charm'd, ecstatic Poet sigh'd
To listening Beauty, bright with conscious Smiles,
And graceful Vanity. But if on Bed
Delirious flung, Sleep from his Pillow flies.
All Night he tosses, nor the balmy Power
In any Posture finds; 'till the grey Morn
Lifts her pale Lustre on the paler Wretch,
Exanimate by Love: and then perhaps
Exhausted Nature sinks a-while to Rest,
Still interrupted by disorder'd Dreams,
That o'er the sick Imagination rise,
And in black Colours paint the mimic Scene.
Oft with the Charmer of his Soul he talks;
Sometimes in Crowds distrest; or if retir'd
To secret-winding, Flower-inwoven Bowers,
Far from the dull Impertinence of Man,
Just as He kneeling all his former Cares
Begins to lose in vast oblivious Love,
Snatch'd from her yielded Hand, he knows not how,
Thro' Forests huge, and long untravel'd Heaths
With Desolation brown, he wanders waste,
In Night and Tempest wrapt; or shrinks aghast,
Back, from the bending Precipice; or wades
The turbid Stream below, and strives to reach
The farther Shore, where succourless, and sad,
His Dearer Life extends her beckoning Arms,
But strives in vain, born by th' outragious Flood
To Distance down, he rides the ridgy Wave,
Or whelm'd beneath the boiling Eddy sinks.
Then a weak, wailing, lamentable Cry
Is heard, and all in Tears he wakes, again
To tread the Circle of revolving Woe.
These are the charming Agonies of Love,
Whose Misery delights. But thro' the Heart
Should Jealousy it's Venom once diffuse,
'Tis then delightful Misery no more,
But Agony unmixt, incessant Rage,
Corroding every Thought, and blasting all
The Paradise of Love. Ye Fairy Prospects then,
Ye Beds of Roses, and ye Bowers of Joy,
Farewell! Ye Gleamings of departing Peace,
Shine out your last! The yellow-tinging Plague
Internal Vision taints, and in a Night
Of livid Gloom Imagination wraps.
Ay then, instead of Love-enliven'd Cheeks,
Of Sunny Features, and of ardent Eyes
With flowing Rapture bright, dark Looks succeed,
Suffus'd, and glaring with untender Fire,
A clouded Aspect, and a burning Cheek,
Where the whole poison'd Soul, malignant, fits,
And frightens Love away. Ten thousand Fears,
Invented wild, ten thousand frantic Views
Of horrid Rivals, hanging on the Charms
For which he melts in Fondness, eat him up
With fervent Anguish, and consuming Pine.
In vain Reproaches lend their idle Aid,
Deceitful Pride, and Resolution frail,
Giving a Moment's Ease. Reflection pours,
Afresh, her Beauties on his busy Thought,
Her first Endearments, twining round the Soul,
With all the Witchcraft of ensnaring Love.
Strait the fierce Storm involves his Mind anew,
Flames thro' the Nerves, and boils along the Veins;
While anxious Doubt distracts the tortur'd Heart;
For even the sad Assurance of his Fears
Were Heaven to what he feels. Thus the warm Youth,
Whom Love deludes into his thorny Wilds,
Thro' flowery-tempting Paths, or leads a Life
Of feavor'd Rapture, or of cruel Care;
His brightest Aims extinguish'd all, and all
His lively Moments running down to Waste.
(pp. 48-54)",,21063,"","""Reflection pours, / Afresh, her Beauties on his busy Thought, / Her first Endearments, twining round the Soul, / With all the Witchcraft of ensnaring Love.""","",2013-06-20 19:53:45 UTC,Reading
4525,"","Reading Patricia Meyer Spacks, An Argument of Images: The Poetry of Alexander Pope (Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1971), 3.",2017-03-08 19:58:54 UTC,"GOD loves from Whole to Parts: but human Soul
Must rise from Individual to the Whole.
Self-Love but serves the virtuous Mind to wake,
As the small Pebble stirs the peaceful Lake,
The Centre mov'd, a Circle strait succeeds,
Another still, and still another spreads;
Friend, Parent, Neighbour, first it will embrace,
His Country next, and next all human-Race.
Wide, and more wide, th' O'erflowings of the Mind
Take ev'ry Creature in, of ev'ry Kind;
Earth smiles around, with boundless Bounty blest,
And Heav'n beholds its Image in his Breast.
(pp. 52-3, Epistle IV, ll. 361-372)",,25041,"","""Self-Love but serves the virtuous Mind to wake, / As the small Pebble stirs the peaceful Lake, / The Centre mov'd, a Circle strait succeeds, / Another still, and still another spreads.""","",2017-03-08 19:58:54 UTC,Epistle IV