Page:Selections from the American poets (IA selectamerpoet00bryarich).pdf/18
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14
Philip Freneau.
Should the vast circuit of the world contain
Such wastes of ocean and such scanty land?
'Tis reason's voice that bids me think not so;
I think more nobly of the Almighty hand.
Does yon fair lamp trace half the circle round
To light mere waves and monsters of the seas!
No; be there must, beyond the billowy waste,
Islands, and men, and animals, and trees.
An unremitting flame my breast inspires
To seek now lands amid the barren waves,
Where, falling low, the source of day descends,
And the blue sea his evening visage laves.
Hear, in his tragic lay, Cordova's sage:[1]
"The time may come, when numerous years are past,
When ocean will unloose the bands of things,
And an unbounded region rise at last;
And Typhis may disclose the mighty land,
Far, far away, where none have raved before;
Nor will the world's remotest region be
Gibraltar's rock, or Thule's savage shore."
Fired at the theme, I languish to depart;
Supply the bark, and bid Columbus sail;
He fears no storms upon the untravell'd deep;
Reason shall steer, and skill disarm the gale.
Nor does he dread to miss the intended course,
Though far from land the reeling galley stray,
And skies above, and gulfy seas below,
Be the sole objects seen for many a day.
Such wastes of ocean and such scanty land?
'Tis reason's voice that bids me think not so;
I think more nobly of the Almighty hand.
Does yon fair lamp trace half the circle round
To light mere waves and monsters of the seas!
No; be there must, beyond the billowy waste,
Islands, and men, and animals, and trees.
An unremitting flame my breast inspires
To seek now lands amid the barren waves,
Where, falling low, the source of day descends,
And the blue sea his evening visage laves.
Hear, in his tragic lay, Cordova's sage:[1]
"The time may come, when numerous years are past,
When ocean will unloose the bands of things,
And an unbounded region rise at last;
And Typhis may disclose the mighty land,
Far, far away, where none have raved before;
Nor will the world's remotest region be
Gibraltar's rock, or Thule's savage shore."
Fired at the theme, I languish to depart;
Supply the bark, and bid Columbus sail;
He fears no storms upon the untravell'd deep;
Reason shall steer, and skill disarm the gale.
Nor does he dread to miss the intended course,
Though far from land the reeling galley stray,
And skies above, and gulfy seas below,
Be the sole objects seen for many a day.