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  • Rest U14 Collins

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    Ali RaZza Khan
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    1) The poem memorializes William Thomson, who died in 1748 and was buried near Richmond. It describes visiting Thomson's grave and imagining his spirit still haunting the landscape along the Thames river. 2) The poem expresses sorrow at Thomson's early death and "lorn fate," as nature itself mourns the loss of his life. Scenes from his poems and life are revisited at his gravesite. 3) Future visitors will weep at Thomson's grave and remember him as the "Druid" who lay in the fields and wilds that were so important to his poetry. His influence and memory will long remain in that place.

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    27636 Rest U14 Collins

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    1) The poem memorializes William Thomson, who died in 1748 and was buried near Richmond. It describes visiting Thomson's grave and imagining his spirit still haunting the landscape along the Thames river. 2) The poem expresses sorrow at Thomson's early death and "lorn fate," as nature itself mourns the loss of his life. Scenes from his poems and life are revisited at his gravesite. 3) Future visitors will weep at Thomson's grave and remember him as the "Druid" who lay in the fields and wilds that were so important to his poetry. His influence and memory will long remain in that place.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    Download as pdf or txt
    258 views2 pages

    Rest U14 Collins

    Uploaded by

    Ali RaZza Khan
    1) The poem memorializes William Thomson, who died in 1748 and was buried near Richmond. It describes visiting Thomson's grave and imagining his spirit still haunting the landscape along the Thames river. 2) The poem expresses sorrow at Thomson's early death and "lorn fate," as nature itself mourns the loss of his life. Scenes from his poems and life are revisited at his gravesite. 3) Future visitors will weep at Thomson's grave and remember him as the "Druid" who lay in the fields and wilds that were so important to his poetry. His influence and memory will long remain in that place.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 2

    1

    WILLIAM COLLINS
    1721–1759

    Ode Written in the Beginning of the Year 1746


    How sleep the brave1 who sink to rest
    By all their country’s wishes blest!
    When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
    Returns to deck their hallowed mold,
    5 She there shall dress a sweeter sod
    Than Fancy’s feet have ever trod.

    By fairy hands their knell is rung,


    By forms unseen their dirge is sung;
    There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray,
    10 To bless the turf that wraps their clay,
    And Freedom shall awhile repair,
    To dwell a weeping hermit there!

    1746

    Ode on the Death of Mr. Thomson1


    1
    In yonder grave a Druid2 lies
    Where slowly winds the stealing wave!
    The year’s best sweets shall duteous rise
    To deck its poet’s sylvan grave!3
    2
    5 In yon deep bed of whispering reeds
    His airy harp4 shall now be laid,
    That he, whose heart in sorrow bleeds,
    May love through life the soothing shade.
    3
    Then maids and youths shall linger here,
    10 And while its sounds at distance swell,

    1. Collins is presumably thinking of those who lost 2. I.e., Thomson himself. The Druids, an order of
    their lives defending England in 1745, when the priests in ancient Britain, had been idealized by
    Scotch Jacobites, led by Bonnie Prince Charlie, Thomson as poet-philosophers of nature. Druidic
    penetrated to within 127 miles of London. circles like Stonehenge remain standing in En-
    1. James Thomson died in 1748 and was buried in gland, and Collins’s Ode itself might be said to have
    the parish church of Richmond, a village on the a circular form (the same beginning and ending).
    Thames near London. Collins memorializes the 3. The year pays tribute to Thomson because he
    poet, who was his friend, both by imagining a visit wrote The Seasons.
    to his grave and by filling his own verses with rem- 4. Thomson had helped to popularize the Aeolian
    iniscences of Thomson’s poetry. harp, which is played by the wind.
    2 / William Collins

    Shall sadly seem in pity’s ear


    To hear the woodland pilgrim’s knell.
    4
    Remembrance oft shall haunt the shore
    When Thames in summer wreaths is dressed,
    15 And oft suspend the dashing oar
    To bid his gentle spirit rest!
    5
    And oft as ease and health retire
    To breezy lawn or forest deep,
    The friend shall view yon whitening spire,5
    20 And mid the varied landscape weep.
    6
    But thou, who own’st that earthy bed,
    Ah! what will every dirge avail?
    Or tears, which love and pity shed
    That mourn beneath the gliding sail!
    7
    25 Yet lives there one, whose heedless eye
    Shall scorn thy pale shrine glimmering near?
    With him, sweet bard, may fancy die,
    And joy desert the blooming year.
    8
    But thou, lorn stream, whose sullen tide
    30 No sedge-crowned sisters6 now attend,
    Now waft me from the green hill’s side,
    Whose cold turf hides the buried friend!
    9
    And see, the fairy valleys fade,
    Dun night has veiled the solemn view!
    35 —Yet once again, dear parted shade,
    Meek nature’s child, again adieu!
    10
    The genial meads,° assigned to bless fostering meadows
    Thy life, shall mourn thy early doom,
    Their hinds° and shepherd girls shall dress peasants
    40 With simple hands thy rural tomb.
    11
    Long, long, thy stone and pointed7 clay
    Shall melt the musing Briton’s eyes,
    “O! vales and wild woods,” shall he say,
    “In yonder grave your Druid lies!”

    1749

    5. Richmond Church, seen from the water. deserted the Thames since Thomson’s death.
    6. Naiads, or river nymphs, supposed to have 7. I.e., pointed out to visitors.

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