Page:Corinne - L. E. L.pdf/5

In adverse fortunes; and it glory wins,
If some chance tide, more happy, floats to shore.
The grave is in the port; and destiny,
In thousand shapes, heralds the close of life
By a return of happiness.

    Thus the ill-fated Tasso, whom your praise,
O Romans! 'mid his wrongs, could yet console,—
The beautiful, the chivalric, the brave,
Dreaming the deeds, feeling the love he sung,—
With awe and gratitude approach’d your walls,
As did his heroes to Jerusalem.
They named the day to crown him; but its eve
Death bade him to his feast, the terrible!
The Heaven is jealous of the Earth; and calls
Its favourites from the stormy waves of time.

    ‘Twas in an age more happy and more free
Than Tasso's that, like Dante, Petrarch sang:
Brave poet of Italian liberty.
Elsewhere they know him only by his love:
Here memories more severe aye consecrate
His sacred name; his country could inspire
E'en more than Laura.

    His vigils gave antiquity new life;
Imagination was no obstacle
To his deep studies: that creative power
Conquer'd the future, and reveal'd the past.
He proved how knowledge lends invention aid;
And more original his genius seem'd,
When, like the powers eternal, it could be
Present in every time.

    Our laughing climate, and our air serene
Inspired our Ariosto: after war,
Our many long and cruel wars, he came
Like to a rainbow; varied and as bright
As that glad messenger of summer hours,
His light, sweet gaiety is like nature's smile,
And not the irony of man.

    Raffaële, Galileo, Angelo,
Pergolese; you! intrepid voyagers,
Greedy of other lands, though Nature never
Could yield ye one more lovely than your own;
Come ye, and to our poets join your fame:
Artists, and sages, and philosophers,