"For what is sleep, but temporary death; / Sealing up all the windows of the soul, / And binding ev'ry thought in torpid chains?"
— Robinson [Née Darby], Mary [Perdita] (1758-1800)
Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed by T. Spilsbury and Son, Sold by J. Evans
Date
1793
Metaphor
"For what is sleep, but temporary death; / Sealing up all the windows of the soul, / And binding ev'ry thought in torpid chains?"
Metaphor in Context
Oblivion horrible! to know no change;
Nor light from darkness! nor the human form,
The image of perfection infinite!
To fashion various phantoms of the brain,
By each amus'd, and yet by each deceiv'd!
To roll the aching eye, alas! in vain,
And still to find a melancholy blank
Of years, and months, and days, and ling'ring hours,
All dark alike, eternally obscure!
To such a wretch! whose brightest sense of bliss
Is but the shadow of a waking dream,
The sleep of death, with all its startling fears,
Must teem with prospects of Elysium!
For what is sleep, but temporary death;
Sealing up all the windows of the soul,
And binding ev'ry thought in torpid chains?
Yet, only for a time the spell controuls,
And soothing visions gild the transient gloom;
For every active faculty of mind
Springs from the numbing apathy of sleep
With renovated lustre and delight!
But he who knows one unenlighten'd void,
One dreary night, unbless'd with cheerful dreams,
Lives in the midst of Death; and, when he sleeps,
Feeds a perpetual solitude of woe,
Without one ray to dissipate its gloom.
(pp. 2-3 in 1793 ed., pp. 29-30 in 1806)
Nor light from darkness! nor the human form,
The image of perfection infinite!
To fashion various phantoms of the brain,
By each amus'd, and yet by each deceiv'd!
To roll the aching eye, alas! in vain,
And still to find a melancholy blank
Of years, and months, and days, and ling'ring hours,
All dark alike, eternally obscure!
To such a wretch! whose brightest sense of bliss
Is but the shadow of a waking dream,
The sleep of death, with all its startling fears,
Must teem with prospects of Elysium!
For what is sleep, but temporary death;
Sealing up all the windows of the soul,
And binding ev'ry thought in torpid chains?
Yet, only for a time the spell controuls,
And soothing visions gild the transient gloom;
For every active faculty of mind
Springs from the numbing apathy of sleep
With renovated lustre and delight!
But he who knows one unenlighten'd void,
One dreary night, unbless'd with cheerful dreams,
Lives in the midst of Death; and, when he sleeps,
Feeds a perpetual solitude of woe,
Without one ray to dissipate its gloom.
(pp. 2-3 in 1793 ed., pp. 29-30 in 1806)
Provenance
Searching "soul" and "seal" in HDIS (Poetry); found again "window"
Citation
Mary Robinson, Sight, the Cavern of Woe, and Solitude. Poems by Mrs. Mary Robinson (Printed by T. Spilsbury and Son, Sold by J. Evans, 1793). <Link to ECCO>
Text from "Sight. Inscribed to John Taylor, Esq. Oculist to his Majesty," in The Poetical Works of the Late Mrs Mary Robinson: Including Many Pieces Never before Published, 3 vols. (London: Printed for Richard Phillips, 1806). <Link to vol. i in Google Books>
Text from "Sight. Inscribed to John Taylor, Esq. Oculist to his Majesty," in The Poetical Works of the Late Mrs Mary Robinson: Including Many Pieces Never before Published, 3 vols. (London: Printed for Richard Phillips, 1806). <Link to vol. i in Google Books>
Date of Entry
04/19/2005
Date of Review
05/23/2011
