Excerpt from Dramas and Poems
Prologue.
To paint the Past, yet in the Past portray
Such shapes as seem dim prophets of To-day; -
To trace, through all the garish streams of art,
Nature's deep fountain - woman's silent heart; -
On the stirr'd surface of the soften'd mind
To leave the print of holier truths behind; -
And, while through joy or grief - through calm or strife,
Bound the wild Passions on the course of Life,
To share the race - yet point the proper goal,
And make the Affections preachers to the Soul; -
Such is the aim with which a gaudier age
Now woos the brief revival of the stage; -
Such is the moral, though unseen it flows,
In Lauzun's wiles and soft La Valltere's woes;
Such the design our Author boldly drew,
And, losing boldness, now submits to You.
Not new to climes where dreamy Fable dwells -
That magic Prospero of the Isle of Spells -
Now first the wanderer treads, with anxious fear,
The fairy land whose flowers allured him here.
Dread is the court our alien pleads before;
Your verdict makes his exile from the shore.
Yet, ev'n if banish'd, let him think, in pride,
He trod the path with no unhallow'd guide;
Chasing the light, whose face, though veil'd and dim,
Perchance a meteor, seem'd a star to him,
Hoping the ray might rest where Truth appears
Beneath her native well - your smiles and tears.
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