SCARCE had the cedar cleft the virgin wave,
That erst to Tyre its chaste embraces gave;
Scarce had the bold Phoenician, forced to roam
By barren nature and a desert home;
His vales of rock exchanged for Ocean's field,
And left the plough's, the trident's beam to wield;
When Cadmus, eldest heir of classick fame,
First gave each element of thought a name.
Of oral tongue the varying sounds he caught,
For every tone a varying emblem wrought;
From signs a word; from words a period flows;
A page succeeds, and next a volume grows.
Thus, on the surface of the polished rind,
He sketched the features of the viewless mind;
At length aspired to rhetorick's colouring grace,
And pictured thought, as artists shade the face.
Now to Achaia's rude, unlettered shore, His glorious art the bold discoverer bore. In that calm seat of innocence and ease,
Where Nature strove to bless, and Life to please:
No ruffling passion shook the placid breast,
For Anger's fluid surface was at rest.
With rising sun, the swain his course renewed,
His flock conducted, or his Daphne wooed;
And when his yows she heard in dale or grove,
Her smile was friendship; but her blush was love.
No jealous fear, as roving arm in arm,
Her brow could wrinkle, or her heart alarm;
As chaste, as Eve, when she, in virtue pure,
Without a fig-leaf thought her charms secure.
Soon, for the sceptre, was the crook resigned, And arts and arms employed the active mind. From Attick climes, the Cadmean tablet spread, And Roman eyes the page of Athens read. By Genius sunned, by fond Ambition nursed, Forth from its germ the flower of Science burst. Now rose the temple; now the clarion rung; The forum thundered, and the Muses sung: Now flew the shuttle; now the quarry broke; There breathed the canvass; here the marble spoke.
Be such the lay to sons of elder time,
Whose green tombs flourish in immortal prime.
May no rude Saracen's unhallowed tread
Profane the ashes of the classick dead!
But let the pedant, whelmed in learned dust,
Who values Science only for its rust,
No more presume with bigot zeal to raise,
O'er modern worth, the palm of ancient days.
No more let Athens to the world proclaim,
Her classick phalanx holds the field of fame;
No more let delving Tyre's mechanic host
The birth of letters, as of commerce, boast;
And thou, proud Tyber! vaunt those waves no more,
Which once a Cesar bathed, a Virgil bore!
The barbarous Rhine now blends its classick name,
With Rome's, Phoenicia's, and Achaia's fame;
See, midst her waves, their fragrance to restore,
He dips the laurels, which your heroes wore;
Green with new life, and chastened of their dust,
Restores each chaplet to its votive bust.
Sovereign of Art, Invention's noblest son,
He claims the bays, which every art has won;
Of fame unenvious, living worth rewards,
And loves the genius, which his page records.
Egyptian shrubs, in hands of cook or priest,
A king could mummy, or enrich a feast;
Faustus, great shade! a nobler leaf imparts,
Embalms all ages, and preserves all arts.
The ancient scribe, employed by bards divine, With faultering finger traced the lingering line. So few the scrivener's dull profession chose, With tedious toil each tardy transcript rose; And scarce the Iliad, penned from oral rhyme, Grew with the bark, that bore its page sublime.
But when the Press, with fertile womb, supplies The useful sheet, on thousand wings it flies; Bound to no climate, to no age confined, The pinioned volume spreads to all mankind.
No sacred power the Cadmean art could claim,
O'er time to triumph, and defy the flame :
In one sad day a Goth could ravage more,
Than ages wrote, or ages could restore.
The Roman hemlet, or the Grecian lyre,
A realm might conquer, or a realm inspire;"
Then sink, oblivious, in the mouldering dust,
With those who blest them, and with those who curst.
What guide had then the lettered pilgrim led,
Where Plato moralized; where Cesar bled?
What page had told, in lasting record wrought,
The world who butchered, or the world who taught?
Thine was the mighty power, immortal sage!
To burst the cearments of each buried age.
Through the drear sepulchre of sunless Time,
Rich with the trophied wrecks of many a clime,
Thy daring genius broke the pathless way,
And brought the glorious relicks forth to day.
To thee the historian's pen, indebted, owes
The map of ages, which his page bestows:
From thee e'en Fame inhales the air, she breathes,
And crowns thy brows with tributary wreathes!
The Press, that engine, formed to rouse mankind,
To expand the heart, and civilize the mind,
In feats, like these, each statesman has outdone,
From Nimrod's house of peers, to Chatham's peerless son!
By Freedom guarded, and by Virtue graced,
It weeds the morals, while it prunes the taste.
But when, in thraldom of oppressive chains,
The curb of power the liberal press restrains,
Vice, who has charms, Circassia never knew,
In voice a Circe, and in poison too,
With luring dimples, and with wanton smiles,
The eye enamours, and the heart beguiles.
In publick veins her foul infections roll,
Seduce the nation, and corrupt its soul.
Had Vulcan's web, which once, in realm of Jove, Trapped in crim. con. the tripping queen of love, Of late at Gaul's lascivious court been spread, Ere fettered Type from dread Bastile was led; The magick seine, such shoals its wires had caught, Like Peter's net, had broken with the draught!
The mystick Fossil, whose attracted soul,
With fond affection, seeks its kindred pole,
To bless the globe, had ne'er explored the wave,
But, Cortes-like, discovered to enslave.
Had letters ne'er the bold ambition crowned,
And Printing polished what the magnet found;
In vain had Gama traced the orient way,
And Europe stretched her wings 'mid Indian day;
In vain Columbus, spurning Neptune's roar,
Gave earth a balance, and the sea a shore,
'Till truth-winged Science, bursting Error's night,
Shed her religion, where she beamed her light.
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