"All the shadowy tribes of Mind / In braided dance their murmurs joined, / And all the bright uncounted powers, / Who feed on heaven's ambrosial flowers."
— Collins, William (1721-1759)
Author
Work Title
Place of Publication
London
Publisher
A. Millar, in the Strand
Date
1747 [1746]
Metaphor
"All the shadowy tribes of Mind / In braided dance their murmurs joined, / And all the bright uncounted powers, / Who feed on heaven's ambrosial flowers."
Metaphor in Context
The band, as fairy legends say,
Was wove on that creating day
When He, who called with thought to birth
Yon tented sky, this laughing earth,
And dressed with springs and forests tall,
And poured the main engirting all,
Long by the loved Enthusiast wooed,
Himself in some diviner mood,
Retiring, sat with her alone,
And placed her on his sapphire throne,
The whiles, the vaulted shrine around,
Seraphic wires were heard to sound,
Now sublimest triumph swelling,
Now on love and mercy dwelling;
And she, from out the veiling cloud,
Breathed her magic notes aloud:
And thou, thou rich-haired youth of morn,
And all thy subject life was born!
The dangerous Passions kept aloof,
Far from the sainted growing woof;
But near it sat ecstatic Wonder,
Listening the deep applauding thunder;
And Truth, in sunny vest arrayed,
By whose the tarsel's eyes were made;
All the shadowy tribes of Mind
In braided dance their murmurs joined,
And all the bright uncounted powers,
Who feed on heaven's ambrosial flowers.
Where is the bard, whose soul can now
Its high presuming hopes avow?
Where he who thinks, with rapture blind,
This hallowed work for him designed?
(ll. 23-54, pp. 429-433; cf. pp. 15-17 in 1747 printing)
Was wove on that creating day
When He, who called with thought to birth
Yon tented sky, this laughing earth,
And dressed with springs and forests tall,
And poured the main engirting all,
Long by the loved Enthusiast wooed,
Himself in some diviner mood,
Retiring, sat with her alone,
And placed her on his sapphire throne,
The whiles, the vaulted shrine around,
Seraphic wires were heard to sound,
Now sublimest triumph swelling,
Now on love and mercy dwelling;
And she, from out the veiling cloud,
Breathed her magic notes aloud:
And thou, thou rich-haired youth of morn,
And all thy subject life was born!
The dangerous Passions kept aloof,
Far from the sainted growing woof;
But near it sat ecstatic Wonder,
Listening the deep applauding thunder;
And Truth, in sunny vest arrayed,
By whose the tarsel's eyes were made;
All the shadowy tribes of Mind
In braided dance their murmurs joined,
And all the bright uncounted powers,
Who feed on heaven's ambrosial flowers.
Where is the bard, whose soul can now
Its high presuming hopes avow?
Where he who thinks, with rapture blind,
This hallowed work for him designed?
(ll. 23-54, pp. 429-433; cf. pp. 15-17 in 1747 printing)
Categories
Provenance
Searching keywords in HDIS (Poetry); confirmed in ECCO.
Citation
At least 29 entries in ECCO and ESTC (1747, 1763, 1765, 1768, 1770, 1771, 1773, 1775, 1776, 1777, 1780, 1781, 1786, 1787, 1796, 1796, 1799, 1800).
See Odes on Several Descriptive and Allegoric Subjects (London: Printed for A. Millar, in the Strand, [1747] [1746]). <Link to ECCO>
Text from Roger Lonsdale's The Poems of Thomas Gray, William Collins, and Oliver Goldsmith (London and New York: Longman and Norton: 1972). <Link to LION>
See Odes on Several Descriptive and Allegoric Subjects (London: Printed for A. Millar, in the Strand, [1747] [1746]). <Link to ECCO>
Text from Roger Lonsdale's The Poems of Thomas Gray, William Collins, and Oliver Goldsmith (London and New York: Longman and Norton: 1972). <Link to LION>
Date of Entry
11/12/2003
Date of Review
01/12/2012
