The Poetical Works of Thomas Chatterton: Life of Chatterton. History of the Rowley controversy. Rowley poems

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W. P. Grant, 1842
 

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Page 80 - The poor soul sat sighing by a sycamore tree, Sing all a green willow ; Her hand on her bosom, her head on her knee, Sing willow, willow, willow...
Page 108 - O! why did God, Creator wise, that peopled highest heaven With spirits masculine, create at last This novelty on earth, this fair defect Of nature, and not fill the world at once With men, as angels, without feminine; Or find some other way to generate Mankind?
Page cxlviii - See ! the white moon shines on high ; Whiter is my true love's shroud ; Whiter than the morning sky, Whiter than the evening cloud.
Page 110 - I know each lane, and every alley green, Dingle, or bushy dell, of this wild wood, And every bosky bourn from side to side, My daily walks and ancient neighbourhood...
Page xcv - ... clerk or apprentice to an attorney, but had a taste and turn for more elegant studies ; and hinted a wish that I would assist him with my interest in emerging out of so dull a profession, by procuring him some place, in which he could pursue his natural bent.
Page 278 - Setting aside the opinion of those uncharitable biographers whose imaginations have conducted him to the gibbet, it may be owned that his unformed character exhibited strong and conflicting elements of good and evil. Even the momentary project of the infidel boy to become a methodist preacher, betrays an obliquity of design, and a contempt of human credulity, that is not very amiable. But, had he been spared, his pride and ambition would have come to flow in their proper channels; his understanding...
Page 9 - I would rather lean to the utmost enthusiasm of his admirers, than to the cold opinion of those •who are afraid of being blinded to the defects of the poems attributed to Rowley, by the veil of obsolete phraseology which is thrown over them. If we look to the ballad of Sir Charles Bawdin, and translate it into modern English, we shall find its strength and interest to have no dependence on obsolete words. In the striking passage of the martyr Bawdin standing erect in his car to rebuke Edward, who...
Page cxxxvii - Through hot Arabia holds its rapid course ; On Tiber's banks where scarlet jasmines bloom, And purple aloes shed a rich perfume ; Where, when the sun is melting in his heat, The reeking tigers find a cool retreat ; Bask in the sedges, lose the sultry beam, And wanton with their shadows in the stream...
Page 74 - Heaven's gates spontaneous opens to the powers, Heaven's golden gates, kept by the winged Hours ; Commission'd in alternate watch they stand, The sun's bright portals and the skies command, Involve in clouds the' eternal gates of day, Or the dark barrier roll with ease away. The sounding hinges ring : on either side The gloomy volumes, pierced with light, divide. The chariot mounts, where deep in ambient skies, Confused, Olympus...
Page cxvii - I must either live a slave, a servant, to have no will of my own, which I may freely declare as such, or DIE.