Different minds incline to different objects; one pursues the vast alone, the wonderful, the wild; another sighs for harmony and grace, and gentlest beauty.
Truth and Good are one; and Beauty dwells in them, and they in her.
The immortal mind, superior to his fate, amid the outrage of external things, firm as the solid base of this great world, rests on his own foundation. Blow, ye winds! Ye waves! ye thunders! roll your tempests on! Shake, ye old pillars of the marble sky! Till at its orbs and all its worlds of fire be loosen'd from their seats; yet still serene, the unconquer'd mind looks down upon the wreck; and ever stronger as the storms advance, firm through the closing ruin holds is way, when nature calls him to the destin'd goal.
Away! Away! Tempt me no more insidious love.
Nor ever yet the melting rainbow's vernal-tinctur'd hues to me have shone so pleasing, as when first the hand of science pointed out the path in which the sun-beams gleaming from the west fall on the watery cloud.
SCIENCE! thou fair effusive ray From the great source of mental Day, Free, generous, and refin'd! Descend with all thy treasures fraught, Illumine each bewilder'd thought, And bless my labour'g mind.
Seeks painted trifles and fantastic toys, and eagerly pursues imaginary joys.
This was Shakespeare's form; who walked in every path of human life, felt every passion; and to all mankind doth now, will ever, that experience yield which his own genius only could acquire.
Such and so various are the tastes of men.
The man forget not, though in rags he lies, and know the mortal through a crown's disguise.
Hence when lightning fires the arch of heaven, and thunders rock the ground, when furious whirlwinds rend the howling air, and ocean, groaning from his lowest bed, heaves his tempestuous billows to the sky; amid the mighty uproar, while below the nations tremble, Shakespeare looks abroad from some high cliff, superior, and enjoys the elemental war.
Thou silent power, whose welcome sway charms every anxious thought away; in whose divine oblivion drown'd, sore pain and weary toil grow mild, love is with kinder looks beguiled, and Grief forgets her fondly cherish'd wound; oh, whither hast thou flown, indulgent god? God of kind shadows and of healing dews, whom dost thou touch with thy Lethaean rod? Around whose temples now thy opiate airs diffuse?
Mark Akenside was an English poet and physician.
