PICTURE OF THE PAST. 91 



hoarded heaps, know not that " Better is little 

 with the fear of the Lord, than great treasure, and 

 trouble therewith," or wasting themselves and 

 substance in riot and intemperance, forget how far 

 sweeter is " a dinner of herbs where love is, than a 

 stalled ox and hatred with the same." 



Let them that list these pleasures then pursue, 

 And on their foolish fancies feed their fill ; 

 So I the fields and meadows green may view, 

 And by the rivers fresh may walke at wille, 

 Among the dazies and the violets blue, 

 Red hyacinth and yellow daffodil, 

 Purple narcissus like the morning rayes, 

 Pale ganderglas, and azore culverkayes. 



I count it better pleasure to behold 

 The goodly compasse of the lofty skie ; 

 And in the midst thereof, like burning gold, 

 The flaming chariot of the world's great eye ; 

 The wat'ry clouds that in the ayre uprol'd 

 With sundry kinds of painted colours flie ; 

 And faire Aurora lifting up her head, 

 All blushing rise from old Tithonus' bed. 



The hills and mountains raised from the plains, 

 The plains extended levell with the ground, 

 The ground divided into sundry vains, 

 The vains enclos'd with running rivers round, 

 The rivers making way thro' nature's chains, 

 With headlong course into the sea profound ; 

 The surging sea beneath the vallies low, 

 The vallies sweet, and lakes that gently flow. 



Oh ! bright Winander, how thy far-stretching 

 beauty lies before me, thy head o^er-canopied by 

 loftiest mountains (gaze in that magic mirror, be- 

 hold the vaulted sky, the breathless woods, the 

 grey gigantic battlements of heaven), thine islands 

 floating in deep cserulean calm like things entranced, 



