"But when your early Care shall have design'd / To plan the Soul and mould the waxen Mind; / When you shall pour upon his tender Breast / Ideas that must stand an Age's Test, / Oh! there imprint with strongest deepest dye / The lovely form of Goddess LIBERTY!"
— Walpole, Horatio [Horace], fourth earl of Orford (1717-1797)
Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed by J. Hughs, for R. Dodsley
Date
w. 1740, 1748
Metaphor
"But when your early Care shall have design'd / To plan the Soul and mould the waxen Mind; / When you shall pour upon his tender Breast / Ideas that must stand an Age's Test, / Oh! there imprint with strongest deepest dye / The lovely form of Goddess LIBERTY!"
Metaphor in Context
Tell him, it is not the fantastick Boy,
Elate with pow'r and swell'd with frantick joy,
'Tis not a slavish Senate, fawning, base,
Can stamp with honest fame a worthless race;
Tho' the false Coin proclaim him great and wise,
The tyrant's life shall tell that Coin, it lyes.
But when your early Care shall have design'd
To plan the Soul and mould the waxen Mind;
When you shall pour upon his tender Breast
Ideas that must stand an Age's Test,
Oh! there imprint with strongest deepest dye
The lovely form of Goddess LIBERTY!
For her in Senates be he train'd to plead,
For her in Battles be he taught to bleed.
Lead him where Dover's rugged cliff resounds
With dashing seas, fair Freedom's honest Bounds,
Point to yon azure Carr bedrop'd with gold,
Whose weight the necks of Gallia's Sons uphold;
Where proudly sits an iron-scepter'd Queen,
And fondly triumphs o'er the prostrate scene,
Cry, that is Empire! shun her baleful path,
Her Words are Slavery, and her Touch is Death!
Thro' wounds and blood the Fury drives her way,
And murthers half, to make the rest her prey.
(pp. 73-4)
Elate with pow'r and swell'd with frantick joy,
'Tis not a slavish Senate, fawning, base,
Can stamp with honest fame a worthless race;
Tho' the false Coin proclaim him great and wise,
The tyrant's life shall tell that Coin, it lyes.
But when your early Care shall have design'd
To plan the Soul and mould the waxen Mind;
When you shall pour upon his tender Breast
Ideas that must stand an Age's Test,
Oh! there imprint with strongest deepest dye
The lovely form of Goddess LIBERTY!
For her in Senates be he train'd to plead,
For her in Battles be he taught to bleed.
Lead him where Dover's rugged cliff resounds
With dashing seas, fair Freedom's honest Bounds,
Point to yon azure Carr bedrop'd with gold,
Whose weight the necks of Gallia's Sons uphold;
Where proudly sits an iron-scepter'd Queen,
And fondly triumphs o'er the prostrate scene,
Cry, that is Empire! shun her baleful path,
Her Words are Slavery, and her Touch is Death!
Thro' wounds and blood the Fury drives her way,
And murthers half, to make the rest her prey.
(pp. 73-4)
Provenance
Searching in ECCO-TCP
Citation
At least 11 entries in ECCO and ESTC (1748, 1751, 1755, 1758, 1763, 1765, 1766, 1775, 1782, 1789, 1798).
Written in the Year 1740. First published as "An Epistle from Florence. To T. A. Esq Tutor to the Earl of P--." See descriptions as "An Epistle from Florence. To Thomas Ashton, Esq. Tutor to the Earl of Plymouth." Manuscripts in Lewis Walpole Library and Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge.
Text from A Collection of Poems in Three Volumes. By Several Hands. (London: Printed by J. Hughs, for R. Dodsley, 1748). <Link to ECCO-TCP>
Found also in Fugitive Pieces in Verse and Prose (1758) and Bell's Fugitive Poetry (1789).
Written in the Year 1740. First published as "An Epistle from Florence. To T. A. Esq Tutor to the Earl of P--." See descriptions as "An Epistle from Florence. To Thomas Ashton, Esq. Tutor to the Earl of Plymouth." Manuscripts in Lewis Walpole Library and Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge.
Text from A Collection of Poems in Three Volumes. By Several Hands. (London: Printed by J. Hughs, for R. Dodsley, 1748). <Link to ECCO-TCP>
Found also in Fugitive Pieces in Verse and Prose (1758) and Bell's Fugitive Poetry (1789).
Date of Entry
11/10/2013
