"Is there whose hours / Of still domestic leisure breathe the soul / Of friendship, peace, and elegant delight / Beneath poetic shades, where leads the Muse / Through walks of fragrance, and the fairy groves / Where young ideas blossom?"
— Barbauld, Anna Letitia [née Aikin] (1743-1825)
Work Title
Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green
Date
1825
Metaphor
"Is there whose hours / Of still domestic leisure breathe the soul / Of friendship, peace, and elegant delight / Beneath poetic shades, where leads the Muse / Through walks of fragrance, and the fairy groves / Where young ideas blossom?"
Metaphor in Context
Is there whom genius and whom taste adorn
With rare but happy union; in whose breast
Calm, philosophic, thoughtful, largely fraught
With stores of various knowledge, dwell the powers
That trace out secret causes, and unveil
Great Nature's awful face? Is there whose hours
Of still domestic leisure breathe the soul
Of friendship, peace, and elegant delight
Beneath poetic shades, where leads the Muse
Through walks of fragrance, and the fairy groves
Where young ideas blossom?--Is there one
Whose tender hand, lenient of human woes,
Wards off the dart of death, and smooths the couch
Of torturing anguish? On so dear a name
May blessings dwell, honour, and cordial praise;
Nor need he be a brother to be loved.
(ll. )
With rare but happy union; in whose breast
Calm, philosophic, thoughtful, largely fraught
With stores of various knowledge, dwell the powers
That trace out secret causes, and unveil
Great Nature's awful face? Is there whose hours
Of still domestic leisure breathe the soul
Of friendship, peace, and elegant delight
Beneath poetic shades, where leads the Muse
Through walks of fragrance, and the fairy groves
Where young ideas blossom?--Is there one
Whose tender hand, lenient of human woes,
Wards off the dart of death, and smooths the couch
Of torturing anguish? On so dear a name
May blessings dwell, honour, and cordial praise;
Nor need he be a brother to be loved.
(ll. )
Categories
Provenance
HDIS (Poetry)
Citation
Some text drawn from The Works of Anna Lætitia Barbauld. With a Memoir by Lucy Aikin (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Browne, and Green, 1825).
Reading McCarthy, William and Kraft, Elizabeth, eds. Anna Letitia Barbauld: Selected Poetry and Prose (Ontario: Broadview Press, 2002).
Reading McCarthy, William and Kraft, Elizabeth, eds. Anna Letitia Barbauld: Selected Poetry and Prose (Ontario: Broadview Press, 2002).
Date of Entry
01/03/2004
