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SOUTHERN LITERARY GAZETTE:
HM. C. RICHARDS, EDITOR.
©rigincil JJJortrg.
For the Southern Literary Gazette.
COMEJSACK!
‘C-omo back ! come back! at stilly morning hour,
Wc miss the mellow tones of thy sweet voice
Carolling lightly in thy favorite bower:
Come back! oh, dear one, make our hearts rejoice!
Let us, delighted, watch thy fairy feet,
Pressing the dew-clad lawn with careless grace—
Give us, once more, thy matin-greetings sweet,
And scatter sun-beams from thine angel face !
Come back ! come back!
Come back! ah! during noontide's ardent glow,
Thy place now empty —thy abandoned chair,
Bring up the thoughts of converse sweet and low —
The beaming eye—the pensive brow so fair.
How the full-swelling heart still fondly lingers
O’er each familiar object of thy care!
The chords o’er which thy rosy-taper fingers
Wandered so lightly—but 1 must forbear !
Come back! come back !
Come back! come back! when evening shades are
round thee,
Fly not thy thoughts to childhood’s distant home?
Oh! when the shafts of fell misfortune wound thee,
Think that some kindly spirit whispers, * Come !’
Sad, though resigned, here sits thy tender mother;
Others are round her —sons and daughters dear—
Still her fond heart is longing for another;
That one, the joy—the grief—the hope—the fear!
Come back ! come back !
Come back ! we mourn thee at the close of day,
When gathering round the bright and blazing
hearth;
We miss thy pleasant fancy’s cheerful play,
And the clear ring of thy contagious mirth.
Or when we sing our vesper hymn of praise,
For blessings granted, and for sins forgiven,
We shrine thee in our high and solemn lays,
And breathe thy name in ardent prayers to
Heaven !
Come back ! come hack!
EREMUS.
For the Southern Literary Gazette.
A WISH-SONNET.
BY WILLIAM C . RICHARDS.
Deep in ray heart a wish for thee abides,
A kindly wish, the offspring of esteem —
That while adown Life’s darkly flowing stream,
Thy fragile barque with ceaseless motion glides,
It may escape each treacherous rock that hides
Its threatening front beneath a surface fair — .
And, uuassailed by storms, in safety bear
Thee to that haven where no ill betides.
But vain is human skill its course to guide,
’Mid the thick dangers that beset Life’s stream,
And vainer still, when tossed on Death’s dark tide,
No ray of earthly light shall ’round it gleam !
Kind Heaven befriend thee, and thy pilot be,
To the blest shores of Immortality !
For the Southern Literary Gazette.
LEONILLA.
A SERENADE.
Sweet Leonilla ! if my song
Might win one smile fro*”
The worthless strain I would prolong
Unceasingly:
But in vain I pour my numbers —
Thou art wrapped in rosy slumbers ;
Not a sigh escapes thy breast—
Peaceful, holy is thy rest:
Tenderly upon thy pillow
Droops thy Hebe head;
Kind angels guard thy bed —
Leonilla!
Dear Leonilla —if thy heart
Returned the love of mine,
E’en in sleep’t would throb and start
At every line!
But now I sing to thee in vain—
Thy heart wears not th’ electric chain
Whereon Love’s fires like lightnings fly,
To kindle rapture in thine eye.
Cold and (.haste as ocean’s billow
Is thy maiden heart:
Sadly I depart,
Leonilla! EPSILON.
A WEEKLY JOURNAL OF LITERATURE, SCIENCE AND ART.
Sketches of Character.
For the Southern Literary Gazette.
ABRAHAM COWLEY.
BY THE EDITOR.
The period of English history in which the
subject of this sketch flourished, was marked
by mighty events, which, while they deeply
affected the civil affairs, could not fail to in
fluence, to a greater or less extent, the litera
ture and taste of the nation. It was not then
—as in our day—that authors almost out
numbered their readers. They were a select
class, and the cultivation of Letters was con
fined to the comparatively few. The civil
war which resulted in the overthrow of the
ancient monarchy, and the erection of a com
monwealth, was, for the time, unfavorable to
the growth of Literature; and although the
Protector realized, in the high national posi
tion of England and her acknowledged su
premacy abroad, his enthusiastic boast that
he would make the name of Englishman more
famous than was ever that of Roman, he ad
ded nothing to her literary reputation. The
reason of this is undoubtedly to be found in
Cromwell’s want of inclination for the pur
suits of Literature, superadded to the disquie
tude of the times. There were, however, at
this period, some men whose names still shine
out with an unfading lustre —chief among
whom are Milton, Dryden, Waller, Butler,
Locke, Izaak Walton, Bunyan, Cudworth,
Barrow, Tillotson and South —all of whom
were contemporaries of Cowley, though in
most cases they reached the zenith of their
reputation at a later date than he.
Cowley was bom in the City of London, in
the year 1618. He was the posthumous son
of a respectable grocer, and his mother had
sufficient influence to obtain his entrance as a
King’s scholar into the Westminster School,
where he made remarkable progress in clas
sical studies, though he complains of his
memory as being defective in acquiring the
rules of grammar. While at school, and in
his sixteenth year, he published a volume of
Poems, under the title of Poetical Blossoms.
He was possessed of a large ambition, and we
find him giving vent to it at a very early pe
riod, in the following lines :
“ What shall I do to be forever known,
And make the age to come my own ?”
When only eighteen years of age, he entered
at Cambridge University, having been elected
a scholar of Trinity College. Here, too, he
distinguished himself, and published a pasto
ral Comedy, entitled Love’s Riddle. In Latin
verse he also excelled, and wrote the Naufra
gium Joculare , a Comedy, which was acted
by the students of Trinity, before the whole
University, and won considerable applause.
In the twenty-fifth year of his age, he was
ejected from Cambridge on account of his
adherence to the King, and being admitted at
Oxford, he there wrote a satire under the ti
tle of the “Puritan and Papist.”
ATHENS, GEORGIA, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 25, ISIS.
Subsequently he accompanied the Queen-
Mother to France, and for ten years did not
return to his native land. During all that pe
riod, he was actively employed in the cause
of the royal family, for whom he performed
several embassies —and was the medium of
correspondence between the King and the
Queen-Mother. For years he performed the
laborious task of decyphering the letters
which passed between them.
Returning to England in 1656, he was still
an agent of royalty, and in some way render
ed himself so obnoxious to the ruling powers,
that he was arrested, and secured his person
al liberty only through the generosity of the
celebrated Scarborough, who gave bail for
him in the sum of one thousand pounds. At
this time he became ostensibly a physician,
but shortly after, returned to France, where
he remained until the Restoration.
Not long after this he published his “Cut
ter of Coleman Street,” a satirical drama, in
which the excesses of the Cavaliers were
shewn up in high colors. This was miscon
strued at Court, and may have been one of
the reasons why its author was overlooked
in the bestowment of rewards under the new
regime. That Cowley anticipated some to
ken of the royal favor, there can be no doubt.
He, however, received none; and without sup
posing him to have been mercenary, we can
readily conceive that he felt keenly the dis
appointment. It gave him such a disaffec
tion towards court life, that he retired into the
country, and through the interest of the Duke
of Buckingham and the Earl of St. Albans,
he obtained the lease of a pretty farm at
Chertsey —the property of the Queen —which
yielded him an income of about three hun
dred pounds, and placed him in easy circum
stances.
This inclination to rural life was, as we
have said, the fruit of disappointment in his
expectation of royal favor; and it did not
prove entirely favorable to his enjoyment.—
He spent his time partly in agricultural and
partly in literary avocations. Here he com
posed his prose essays, which, though not
very extensive, and at this day comparatively
little known to the general reader, are mark
ed by an exceedingly pure and natural style,
entitling him to high rank among his contem
poraries as a prose writer.
It is as a poet that Cowley is best known
to our times, and his verse is preserved in
every collection of the British Poets—and in
its own independent volumes—and thus kept
fresh in the recollection of thousands of read
ers who wish to preserve every important
link of that great chain which binds the pres
ent era of Poetry to the Elizabethan Age.
Our limits will not allow’ us to enter into a
closer analysis of the poetry of Cowley. It
is not of that order which commands the ad
miration of the majority of readers. It is
moreover, so marked, and we may say, so
marred, with odd conceits, and the structure
of his verse is so laborious and ultra-artificial,
that his true genius and his vigorous imagi
nation are too often overlooked. Moreover,
we are inclined to think tliat he lacked alto
gether that earnestness which is essential to
enduring fame. Mere brilliance and wit, un
attended by the conservative power of a high
purpose, cannot have an enduring influence
over the hearts of men. Cowley wrote from
his head, and not from his heart, and even his
love poetry is artificial —glittering only as an
ice-berg glitters in the radiance of the noon
day sun.
His Anacreontics have most grace and life
likeness about them of all his productions.
Some of them sparkle with a fancy that w'e
can love as well as admire. His Davideis is
VOLUME I.—NUMBER 29.
a cumbrous and unfinished poem in the he
roic measure. In connection with this brief
view of his writings, we have selected a few
specimens, of which the first are two of his
Anacreontics :
GOLD.
A mighty pain to love it is,
And tis a pain that pain to miss,
But of all pain the greatest pain
It is to love, but love in vain.
Virtue now nor noble blood,
Nor wit, by love is understood.
Gold alone does passion move ;
Gold monopolizes love!
A curse on her and on the man
Who this traffic first began!
A curse on him who found the ore!
A curse on him who digg’d the store!
A curse on him who did refine it!
A curse on him who first did coin it!
A curse nil curses else above
On him who us’d it first in love!
Gold begets in brethren hate;
Gold, in families debate ;
Gold does friendship separate ,
Gold does civil wars create.
These the smallest harms of it;
Gold, alas ! does love beget.
THE EPICURE
Fill the bowl with rosy wine,
Around our temples roses twine,
And let us cheerfully a while,
Like the wine and roses smile.
Crown’d with roses, we contemn
Gyges’ wealthy diadem.
To-day is ours ; what do wo fear I
To-day is ours; we have it here.
Let’s treat it kindly, that it may
Wish at least with us to stay.
Let’s banish business ; banish sorrow ;
To the gods belongs to-morrow.
The next specimen is an extract from a
graceful and imaginative Ode, on the death of
his college friend, William Harvey :
It was a dismal and a fearful night,
Scarce could the morn drive on th’ unwilling light.
When sleep, death’s image, loft my troubled breast,
By something liker death possest.
My eyes with tears did uncommanded flow.
And on my soul hung the dull weight
Os some intolerable fate.
What bell was that 1 Ah me ! too much I know.
My sweet companion, and my gentle peer.
Why hai t thou left me thus unkindly here.
Thy end forever, and my life to moan'?
O thou hast left me all alone !
Thy soul and body, when death’s agODy
Besieged around thy noble heart,
Did not with more reluctance part
Than I, my dearest friend, do part from thee.
My dearest friend! would I had died for thee !
Life and this world henceforth will tedious be.
Nor shall I know hereafter what to do,
If once my griefs prove tedious too.
Silent and sad I walk about all day,
As sullen ghosts stalk speechless by
Where their hid treasures lie ;
Alas, my treasure’s gone! why do I stay 1
He was my friond, the truest friend on earth ;
A strong and mighty influence join'd our birth.
Nor did we envy the most sounding name
By friendship given of old to fame.
None but his brethren, he, and sisters, knew,
Whom the kind youth preferred to me ;
And ev’n in that we did agree,
For much above myself I loved them too.
Say, for you saw us, ye immortal lights,
How oft unwearied have we spent the nights T
Till the Ledaoan stars, so famed for love,
Wonder’d at us from above.
We spent them not in toys, in lusts, or wine,
But search of deep philosophy,
Wit, eloquence, and poetry:
Arts which I lov'd, for they, my friend, were thine ‘
Ye fields of Cambridge, our dear Cambridge, say,
Have ye not seen us walking every day *1
Was there a tree about, which did not know
The love betwixt us two 1
Henceforth, ye gentle trees, forever fade ;
Or your sad branches thicker join,
Aud into darksome shades combine;
Dark as the grave wherein my friend is laid.
A brief passage, quoted by Johnson as a
specimen of his fiction, must close our ex
tracts. It is a description of the Angel Ga
briel :
“He took for skin a cloud most soft snd bright,
That e’er the mid-day sun pierced thro’ with li£ufc ;
Upon his cheek, a lively Mush he spread—
Washed from the morning beauties’ deepest red;
An harmless fluttering meteor shone for hair,
And fell adown his shoulders with loose care ;
Me cuts out a silk mantle from the skies,
Where the most sprightly azure pleased the ey osr;
This ho with starry vapours sprinkles all,
Took in their prime, ere they grow ripe and fall;
Os anew rainbow, ere it fret or fade.
The choicest pieee cut out, a scarf is made ”
Cowley did not find in his retirement that
; perfect peace and enjoyment which he antici
pated. He complains, in a letter to his friend