THE NEWBERY CLASSICS

THE POETICAL WORKS
OF
THOMAS CAMPBELL

REPRINTED FROM THE EARLY EDITIONS

WITH MEMOIR, EXPLANATORY NOTES, ETC.

LONDON
GRIFFITH FARRAN & CO.
NEWBERY HOUSE, CHARING CROSS ROAD

The Rights of Translation and of Reproduction are Reserved.

CONTENTS.

PREFATORY MEMOIR.

Thomas Campbell was born in Glasgow, July 27, 1777. He was of good family, his father being the youngest son of a Highland laird, Campbell of Kirnan, who could trace his descent from Gilespie le Camile, first Norman lord of Lochawe. As was (and is) usual with the younger sons of Scottish families of rank, Campbell’s father was destined for a commercial career. He commenced it in Virginia, where he entered into partnership with a kinsman, and returning with him to Scotland, carried on the business in Glasgow, till the wars between Great Britain and her American Colonies for a time seriously injured British commerce. After incurring severe losses he at length gave up business altogether, and retired into private life with diminished means and a large family.

Thomas, the poet, was the youngest of eleven children, and was born after his father had retired. At eight years of age he was sent to the Grammar School of Glasgow, and became the pupil of David Alison, who soon detected the infant genius of his pupil. The boy worked hard for his years, but his health was delicate, and, like Walter Scott, he had to be sent away for the benefit of country air. Amidst the fields and green lanes he regained health and strength, and returning to his studies made rapid progress, especially in Greek. At twelve years old, he gained prizes for his translations from the Greek poets.

In 1793 Campbell commenced the study of the law in the office of his relative Mr. Alexander Campbell, a Writer to the Signet, of Glasgow; but he soon abandoned it, and again devoted himself to more congenial pursuits. About this time his Lines on Marie Antoinette appeared in the poet’s corner of a Glasgow paper; he had already won a prize for his poem On Description from the University.

In 1795 the failure of a Chancery suit still further reduced his father’s income, and Campbell, eager to reduce the family expenses, sought and obtained a tutorship in the family of a Mrs. Campbell of Sunipol, in the Hebrides, for the summer months. The romantic beauty of his new home strongly impressed the youthful poet, and it was whilst wandering on the wild lonely shores of Mull, that the subject of his celebrated poem the Pleasures of Hope was suggested to him by his friend Mr. Hamilton Paul. A rock on the isle, on which he often sat and mused, obtained and still keeps the name of the “Poet’s Seat.”

In the autumn Campbell returned to his studies at the University, and finally closed his academic career by winning two prizes—one for the Choephorcæ of Aristophanes, and the other for the Chorus in the Medea of Euripides.

After quitting the University, he again became a tutor—this time in the family of General Napier, who was greatly interested in the gifted young man beneath his roof. It was during this residence in Argyleshire that he wrote Love and Madness, and some other poems.

In 1798 the poet proceeded to Edinburgh, determined to try his fortune in the Scottish metropolis. He had an introduction to Dr. Robert Anderson, who, struck with his ability, recommended him to Mr. Mundell, the publisher. Mr. Mundell at once gave him literary work, his first task being to compile an abridgment of Bryan Edward’s West Indies. He also obtained pupils, and thus managed to secure a comfortable livelihood. But by degrees the love of poetry grew too strong for this routine of industry, and he gradually devoted himself to the composition of the Pleasures of Hope. Campbell’s life at this time must have been a very happy one. He was enraptured with his task, and he had many and kind friends in Edinburgh—amongst them was Francis (afterwards Lord) Jeffrey. To his aunt Mrs. Campbell, and to his beautiful cousin Margaret, who resided in Edinburgh, he used to read his verses, and was cheered and encouraged by their applause.

When the poem was finished, Dr. Anderson took it to Mr. Mundell, who, after some consideration, offered the poet £60 for it, an offer which was accepted.

The poem appeared, and Campbell at once became famous. Everywhere it was read and admired, and it secured to the Author a permanent reputation at the age of twenty-one. The Pleasures of Hope went through four editions in a year. In the second edition several new and remarkably fine passages were introduced.

In 1800 Campbell left Scotland in order to visit Germany. He landed at Hamburg; and proceeded, after a short residence there, to Ratisbon, which he reached only three days before the French took it, and was, consequently, obliged to seek a refuge with the monks of the Benedictine College; from the walls of which he beheld a cavalry charge made by the German horse on the French under Grenier. The scenes of war through which it was now his fate to pass, no doubt suggested his fine lyric of Hohenlinden, though he was not a spectator of the fight (Dr. Beattie tells us)—it occurred after he had left the scene of war.

The times were now so troubled that Campbell hastened homeward, the moment he could obtain his passports. At Hamburg, where he remained for a while, he wrote the Exile of Erin. From Hamburg he proceeded to Altona, and thence to England. During his absence he had sent several small poems to the Morning Chronicle, and on his return he was received and welcomed cordially by its editor, Mr. Perry, who introduced him to the best literary society in London. But from the natural enjoyment of his popularity he was called by the tidings of his father’s death, and he hurried at once to Edinburgh. Here he found that an absurd charge of treason had been made against him, which, however, his own prompt and manly demand of an investigation of his conduct at once quashed. Moreover, his trunk, which had been seized on its way homewards, was examined, and amongst his papers was found the glorious national lyric, Ye Mariners of England, which he had written at Altona. The patriotic feeling displayed in it at once assured the Sheriff of Edinburgh of the poet’s innocence of the crime with which he was charged, and the affair ended in the young poet’s character being entirely cleared.

From the period of his father’s death it became Campbell’s duty to provide in a great measure for his widowed mother and his sister, and he worked bravely and patiently for them at literary task-work.

In 1801 he visited London at Lord Minto’s invitation, and passed a season of great gaiety in the midst of the literary celebrities of England. On his return to Edinburgh he published Lochiel, and Hohenlinden, and brought out the seventh edition of the Pleasures of Hope.

In 1802 Campbell married his cousin, Miss Matilda Sinclair, and went shortly afterwards to reside at Sydenham, then a lovely and rather aristocratic place,—where his memory was long cherished, and his dwelling is even now pointed out to strangers.

Here he supported by his literary labour his mother, his wife, and children; and was occupied and happy. He contributed to the Philosophical Magazine, the Star paper, and planned his Specimens of the British Poets.

In 1805 Campbell received a pension of £200 from the Crown, which must have greatly relieved the anxieties of a husband and father dependent on so precarious a profession as literature. But he retained only half for himself; the remainder he divided between his mother and sister; an act of generosity which afterwards, we are told, led to his receiving a handsome legacy of nearly £5,000 from a Highland cousin.

In 1809 Gertrude of Wyoming, Lord Ullin’s Daughter, and The Battle of the Baltic were published. Several prose works also appeared from Campbell’s pen; in 1807, the Annals of Great Britain from the Accession of George III. to the Peace of Amiens, was published anonymously in Edinburgh. He wrote also a Life of Petrarch in 1841, and edited numerous works. In 1818, the long-planned Specimens of the British Poets was produced in London. After this publication, Campbell delivered lectures at the Surrey Institution on English Poetry, and the public pronounced him to be as elegant a critic as he was a fine poet. In a pecuniary sense, everything he did prospered.

In 1824 Theodric was published, which, however, obtained small favour with the public. In fact a new style of poetry had superseded that of the day when the Pleasures of Hope won golden opinions; Scott had since charmed the ear with his Lay and his Lady of the Lake, and had been in turn supplanted by the fiery muse of Byron, and—though not then fully appreciated—the matchless melody and classic charm of Shelley. After the productions of these great poets, the calm and unimpassioned Theodric fell flat on the public ear; in fact there is no comparison between it and the Pleasures of Hope.

As a lyric poet, Campbell, however, continued unrivalled, and would have held his own place in our literature if he had never written more than the Mariners of England and Hohenlinden. Nor did the Pleasures of Hope lose its hold on public favour; it has retained it to this day, except in a certain clique of critics. There are passages in it which will ever have a strong hold on our sympathies; and which will be remembered when the half intelligible utterances of our more modern times shall only excite wonder and amusement.

In 1827 one of Campbell’s early day-dreams, that of being Lord Rector of his own University, was gratified. He was chosen, though no less a rival than Sir Walter Scott was in the field, and he filled the position so well, and so much to the benefit of the University, that he was re-elected the two following years.

In 1820 Colbourne offered him the editorship of the New Monthly Magazine, which he accepted and retained till 1830, at a salary of £500 per annum. His sub-editor—a very efficient one—was Mr. Cyrus Redding.

In 1831 Campbell brought out the Metropolitan Magazine, editing it himself.

Meantime much domestic affliction had fallen on him. He had lost a child, and his dear wife died in 1828, a loss which greatly affected him. But he made himself other strong interests besides domestic and literary ones. The Poles and the Greeks had enlisted his most ardent sympathies, and had the best aid of his pen. Moreover, he travelled in France and Germany, and in 1834 as far as Algiers, from whence he wrote the Letters from the South, published in the Metropolitan Magazine.

In 1838 he was presented to the Queen by the chief of his clan, the Duke of Argyle, at the first levee held by the fair young Sovereign after her accession to the throne. He had loyally offered her a present of his works; the Queen accepted them, and graciously sent him in return her picture. Campbell had been always a Liberal, but, like Leigh Hunt, he was won by the gentle lady who held the sceptre to sincere loyalty to the Crown.

Campbell moved to No. 8, Victoria Square, Pimlico, in 1840, and adopted, as the sharer of his solitary home, his niece, Mary Campbell, whose gentle ministrations soothed his declining years, and brightened the last hours of his life.

In 1842 The Pilgrim of Glencoe was published, but it was not well received, and the aged poet began to perceive that it was time to lay by his pen; that he spoke to a generation he could not charm. Nevertheless his age was honoured and prosperous. His works produced nearly £700 a year, and his means exceeded altogether £1000 per annum. But he fancied he should prefer a cheaper residence than London, and in compliance with the aged poet’s fancy, his niece accompanied him to Boulogne, where they settled, at 5, Rue Petit St. Jean.

Here he remained in a varying state of health till 1844, when he became seriously ill, and the physician, Dr. Allatt, gave no hopes of his recovery. His faithful and beloved friend, Dr. Beattie—by whom a charming memoir of the poet has been since published—came to him, and did his best to soothe the last moments of the dying poet.

His death-bed was truly Christian. Some of his last words were “Come, let us sing praises to Christ,” “Let us pray for one another.”

On the 15th of June 1844, his spirit passed calmly, without a struggle, to a better world.

The body of the poet was brought to England, and on the 3rd of July buried in Westminster Abbey, near the centre of the Poet’s Corner. His funeral was attended by numerous friends and admirers, amongst whom were his chief, the Duke of Argyle, and Sir Robert Peel, then premier.

Thus closed the life of one of the most popular poets of the beginning of our century. Prosperous in its public phase—very sad and sorely tried in its domestic one. He had refined taste and pleasing manners; and no reproach rests upon his private or public character. In his youth he was singularly beautiful in person. Leigh Hunt tells us (in his autobiography) that Campbell’s face and person were rather on a small scale, “his features regular, his eye lively and penetrating, and when he spoke, dimples played about his mouth, which, nevertheless, had something restrained and close in it. Some gentle Puritan seemed to have crossed the breed, and to have left a stamp on his face, such as we often see in the female Scotch face rather than the male.”

No poet, except Shakespeare, has been so frequently quoted as Campbell. Many of his lines have become proverbs:—“Coming events cast their shadows before,” “’Tis distance lends enchantment to the view,” &c., &c., are as familiar to us as household words. “His verses” says a writer in Chambers’s Papers for the People, “cannot be mistaken for those of any other English poet—his odes do not resemble those of Dryden, Collins, or Gray—they stand alone.... Scott said, ‘he could imitate all the modern poets but Tom Campbell,’ he could not imitate him because his peculiarity was more in the matter than the manner.” High praise this! Byron said that he believed Campbell wrote so little poetry because he was afraid of comparison with his early and famous poem: we have not the volume to quote the exact words. We are rather inclined to think that the true reason why he gave us no more poems than we possess at present was, not only that his taste was exceedingly refined and fastidious—he would not admit many charming minor poems into his collected works—but that, like Goldsmith, his time was much occupied by task-work for the publishers; and as he would not suffer hastily written lines to appear, or any which he had not carefully polished, the quantity he produced was necessarily small. We are told in Notes and Queries that he took some pains (returning to the house where he had written it for the purpose) to substitute a single word which he believed would be an improvement on another in his Stanzas to Florine! Consequently, his poems must have occupied time and thought beyond what we may imagine from their length, and his leisure could not have been great. It would have been better, perhaps, if more voluminous poets had imitated his reticence, and given us quality rather than quantity.

Campbell was a pleasant companion, and when he pleased could (we have Byron’s authority for it) talk delightfully; but he was occasionally absent and silent. His poetry is much admired by foreigners. Madame de Staël was enraptured with the Pleasures of Hope, and Goethe was a warm admirer of the Poet.

His domestic character was excellent, and his family sorrows—of which this is no place to speak—were borne by him with patient courage.

His Life, admirably given us by his friend Dr. Beattie,[1] is well worth reading as a record of Genius, aided by patient perseverance, struggling with difficulties, and vanquishing them; and to it, for fuller and far more interesting details, we refer the readers of this brief Prefatory Memoir.

To this collection of his poems we have added his Lines on Marie Antoinette, the Dirge of Wallace, and one or two other poems, published in the New Monthly Magazine.

[1] Life and Letters of Campbell, by Dr. Beattie.

THE
PLEASURES OF HOPE.
PART I.

ANALYSIS OF PART I.

The Poem opens with a comparison between the beauty of remote objects in a landscape, and those ideal scenes of felicity which the imagination delights to contemplate ... the influence of anticipation upon the other passions is next delineated ... an allusion is made to the well-known fiction in Pagan tradition, that, when all the guardian deities of mankind abandoned the world, Hope alone was left behind ... the consolations of this passion in situations of distress ... the seaman on his watch ... the soldier marching into battle ... allusion to the interesting adventures of Byron.

The inspiration of Hope, as it actuates the efforts of genius, whether in the department of science, or of taste ... domestic felicity, how intimately connected with views of future happiness ... picture of a mother watching her infant when asleep ... pictures of the prisoner, the maniac, and the wanderer.

From the consolations of individual misery, a transition is made to prospects of political improvement in the future state of society ... the wide field that is yet open for the progress of humanising arts among uncivilised nations ... from these views of amelioration of society, and the extension of liberty and truth over despotic and barbarous countries, by a melancholy contrast of ideas, we are led to reflect upon the hard fate of a brave people recently conspicuous in their struggles for independence[2] ... description of the capture of Warsaw, of the last contest of the oppressors and the oppressed, and the massacre of the Polish patriots at the bridge of Prague ... apostrophe to the self-interested enemies of human improvement ... the wrongs of Africa ... the barbarous policy of Europeans in India ... prophecy in the Hindoo mythology of the expected descent of the Deity to redress the miseries of their race, and to take vengeance on the violators of justice and mercy.

[2] The Poles. This Poem first appeared in 1799.

PLEASURES OF HOPE.
PART I.

At summer eve, when Heaven’s ethereal bow

Spans with bright arch the glittering hills below,

Why to yon mountain turns the musing eye,

Whose sunbright summit mingles with the sky?

Why do those cliffs of shadowy tint appear

More sweet than all the landscape smiling near?—

’Tis distance lends enchantment to the view,

And robes the mountain in its azure hue.

Thus, with delight we linger to survey

The promised joys of life’s unmeasured way;

Thus, from afar, each dim-discovered scene

More pleasing seems than all the past hath been;

And every form, that Fancy can repair

From dark oblivion, glows divinely there.

What potent spirit guides the raptured eye

To pierce the shades of dim futurity?

Can Wisdom lend, with all her heavenly power,

The pledge of Joy’s anticipated hour?

Ah, no! she darkly sees the fate of man—

Her dim horizon bounded to a span;

Or, if she hold an image to the view,

’Tis Nature pictured too severely true.

With thee, sweet Hope! resides the heavenly light,

That pours remotest rapture on the sight:

Thine is the charm of life’s bewildered way,

That calls each slumbering passion into play.

Waked by thy touch, I see the sister band,

On tiptoe watching, start at thy command,

And fly where’er thy mandate bids them steer,

To Pleasure’s path, or Glory’s bright career.

Primeval Hope, the Aönian Muses say,

When Man and Nature mourned their first decay;

When every form of death, and every woe,

Shot from malignant stars to earth below,

When Murder bared her arm, and rampant War

Yoked the red dragons of her iron car,

When Peace and Mercy, banished from the plain,

Sprung on the viewless winds to heaven again;

All all forsook the friendless guilty mind,

But Hope, the charmer, lingered still behind.

Thus, while Elijah’s burning wheels prepare

From Carmel’s heights to sweep the fields of air.[3]

The prophet’s mantle, ere his flight began,

Dropt on the world—a sacred gift to man.

Auspicious Hope! in thy sweet garden grow

Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every woe;

Won by their sweets, in Nature’s languid hour,

The way-worn pilgrim seeks thy summer bower;

There, as the wild bee murmurs on the wing,

What peaceful dreams thy handmaid spirits bring!

What viewless forms the Æolian organ play,

And sweep the furrowed lines of anxious thought away.

Angel of life! thy glittering wings explore

Earth’s loneliest bounds, and Ocean’s wildest shore.

Lo! to the wintry winds the pilot yields

His bark careering o’er unfathomed fields;

Now on Atlantic waves he rides afar,

Where Andes, giant of the western star,

With meteor-standard to the winds unfurled,

Looks from his throne of clouds o’er half the world!

Now far he sweeps, where scarce a summer smiles,

On Behring’s rocks, or Greenland’s naked isles:

Cold on his midnight watch the breezes blow,

From wastes that slumber in eternal snow;

And waft, across the wave’s tumultuous roar,

The wolf’s long howl from Oonalaska’s shore.

Poor child of danger, nursling of the storm,

Sad are the woes that wreck thy manly form!

Rocks, waves, and winds, the shattered bark delay;

Thy heart is sad, thy home is far away.

But Hope can here her moonlight vigils keep,

And sing to charm the spirit of the deep:

Swift as yon streamer lights the starry pole,

Her visions warm the watchman’s pensive soul;

His native hills that rise in happier climes,

The grot that heard his song of other times,

His cottage home, his bark of slender sail,

His glassy lake, and broomwood-blossomed vale,

Rush on his thought; he sweeps before the wind,

Treads the loved shore he sighed to leave behind;

Meets at each step a friend’s familiar face,

And flies at last to Helen’s long embrace;

Wipes from her cheek the rapture-speaking tear,

And clasps, with many a sigh, his children dear!

While, long neglected, but at length caressed,

His faithful dog salutes the smiling guest,

Points to the master’s eyes (where’er they roam)

His wistful face, and whines a welcome home.

Friend of the brave! in peril’s darkest hour,

Intrepid Virtue looks to thee for power;

To thee the heart its trembling homage yields,

On stormy floods, and carnage-covered fields,

When front to front the bannered hosts combine,

Halt ere they close, and form the dreadful line.

When all is still on Death’s devoted soil,

The march-worn soldier mingles for the toil;

As rings his glittering tube, he lifts on high

The dauntless brow, and spirit-speaking eye,

Hails in his heart the triumph yet to come,

And hears thy stormy music in the drum!

And such thy strength-inspiring aid that bore

The hardy Byron to his native shore—[4]

In horrid climes, where Chiloe’s tempests sweep

Tumultuous murmurs o’er the troubled deep,

’Twas his to mourn Misfortune’s rudest shock,

Scourged by the winds, and cradled on the rock,

To wake each joyless morn, and search again

The famished haunts of solitary men;

Whose race, unyielding as their native storm,

Know not a trace of Nature but the form;

Yet, at thy call, the hardy tar pursued,

Pale, but intrepid—sad, but unsubdued,

Pierced the deep woods, and hailing from afar

The moon’s pale planet and the northern star,

Paused at each dreary cry, unheard before,

Hyænas in the wild, and mermaids on the shore;

Till, led by thee o’er many a cliff sublime,

He found a warmer world, a milder clime,

A home to rest, a shelter to defend,

Peace and repose, a Briton and a friend![5]

Congenial Hope! thy passion-kindling power,

How bright, how strong, in youth’s untroubled hour!

On yon proud height, with Genius hand in hand,

I see thee light, and wave thy golden wand.

“Go, child of Heaven! (thy wingèd words proclaim)

’Tis thine to search the boundless fields of fame?

Lo! Newton, priest of nature, shines afar,

Scans the wide world, and numbers every star!

Wilt thou, with him, mysterious rites apply,

And watch the shrine with wonder-beaming eye!

Yes, thou shalt mark, with magic art profound,

The speed of light, the circling march of sound;

With Franklin grasp the lightning’s fiery wing,

Or yield the lyre of Heaven another string.[6]

“The Swedish sage[7] admires, in yonder bowers,

His winged insects, and his rosy flowers;

Calls from their woodland haunts the savage train

With sounding horn, and counts them on the plain—

So once, at Heaven’s command, the wanderers came

To Eden’s shade, and heard their various name.

“Far from the world, in yon sequestered clime,

Slow pass the sons of Wisdom more sublime;

Calm as the fields of Heaven his sapient eye

The loved Athenian lifts to realms on high,

Admiring Plato, on his spotless page,

Stamps the bright dictates of the Father sage:[8]

‘Shall nature bound to earth’s diurnal span

The fire of God, the immortal soul of man?’

“Turn, child of Heaven, thy rapture-lightened eye

To Wisdom’s walks, the sacred Nine are nigh:

Hark! from bright spires that gild the Delphian height,

From streams that wander in eternal light,

Ranged on their hill, Harmonia’s daughters swell

The mingling tones of horn, and harp, and shell;

Deep from his vaults, the Loxian murmurs flow,[9]

And Pythia’s awful organ peals below.

“Beloved of Heaven! the smiling Muse shall shed

Her moonlight halo on thy beauteous head;

Shall swell thy heart to rapture unconfined,

And breathe a holy madness o’er thy mind.

I see thee roam her guardian power beneath,

And talk with spirits on the midnight heath;

Enquire of guilty wanderers whence they came,

And ask each blood-stained form his earthly name;

Then weave in rapid verse the deeds they tell,

And read the trembling world the tales of hell.

“When Venus, throned in clouds of rosy hue,

Flings from her golden urn the vesper dew,

And bids fond man her glimmering noon employ,

Sacred to love, and walks of tender joy;

A milder mood the goddess shall recall,

And soft as dew thy tones of music fall;

While Beauty’s deeply-pictured smiles impart

A pang more dear than pleasure to the heart—

Warm as thy sighs shall flow the Lesbian strain,

And plead in Beauty’s ear, nor plead in vain.

“Or wilt thou Orphean hymns more sacred deem,

And steep thy song in Mercy’s mellow stream;

To pensive drops the radiant eye beguile—

For Beauty’s tears are lovelier than her smile;—

On Nature’s throbbing anguish pour relief

And teach impassioned souls the joy of grief?

“Yes; to thy tongue shall seraph words be given,

And power on earth to plead the cause of Heaven;

The proud, the cold untroubled heart of stone,

That never mused on sorrow but its own,

Unlocks a generous store at thy command,

Like Horeb’s rocks beneath the prophet’s hand.[10]

The living lumber of his kindred earth,

Charmed into soul, receives a second birth,

Feels thy dread power another heart afford,

Whose passion-touched harmonious strings accord

True as the circling spheres to Nature’s plan;

And man, the brother, lives the friend of man.

“Bright as the pillar rose at Heaven’s command,

When Israel marched along the desert land,

Blazed through the night on lonely wilds afar,

And told the path,—a never-setting star:

So, heavenly Genius, in thy course divine,

Hope is thy star, her light is ever thine.”

Propitious Power! when rankling cares annoy

The sacred home of Hymenean joy;

When doomed to Poverty’s sequestered dell,

The wedded pair of love and virtue dwell,

Unpitied by the world, unknown to fame,

Their woes, their wishes, and their hearts the same—

Oh, there, prophetic Hope! thy smile bestow,

And chase the pangs that worth should never know—

There, as the parent deals his scanty store

To friendless babes, and weeps to give no more,

Tell, that his manly race shall yet assuage

Their father’s wrongs, and shield his latter age.

What though for him no Hybla sweets distil,

Nor bloomy vines wave purple on the hill;

Tell, that when silent years have passed away,

That when his eye grows dim, his tresses grey,

These busy hands a lovelier cot shall build,

And deck with fairer flowers his little field,

And call from Heaven propitious dews to breathe

Arcadian beauty on the barren heath;

Tell, that while Love’s spontaneous smile endears

The days of peace, the sabbath of his years,

Health shall prolong to many a festive hour

The social pleasures of his humble bower.

Lo! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps,

Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps;