No More Learning

Oh, Christ! it is a goodly sight to see
What Heaven hath done for this delicious land! [aq]
What fruits of fragrance blush on every tree!
What goodly prospects o'er the hills expand!
But man would mar them with an impious hand:
And when the Almighty lifts his fiercest scourge
'Gainst those who most transgress his high command,
With treble vengeance will his hot shafts urge
Gaul's locust host, and earth from fellest foemen purge[ar]

XVI.

What beauties doth Lisboa[43] first unfold! [as]
Her image floating on that noble tide,
Which poets vainly pave with sands of gold,[at]
But now whereon a thousand keels did ride
Of mighty strength, since Albion was allied,
And to the Lusians did her aid afford:
A nation swoln with ignorance and pride,[44]
Who lick yet loathe the hand that waves the sword[au]
To save them from the wrath of Gaul's unsparing lord.

XVII.

But whoso entereth within this town,
That, sheening far, celestial seems to be,
Disconsolate will wander up and down,
'Mid many things unsightly to strange ee;[av]
For hut and palace show like filthily:[aw]
The dingy denizens are reared in dirt;[ax]
Ne personage of high or mean degree
Doth care for cleanness of surtout or shirt,
Though shent with Egypt's plague, unkempt, unwashed, unhurt.

XVIII.

Poor, paltry slaves! yet born 'midst noblest scenes--
Why, Nature, waste thy wonders on such men?
Lo! Cintra's glorious Eden intervenes[45]
In variegated maze of mount and glen.
Ah, me!
what hand can pencil guide, or pen,
To follow half on which the eye dilates
Through views more dazzling unto mortal ken[ay]
Than those whereof such things the Bard relates,
Who to the awe-struck world unlocked Elysium's gates.

XIX.

The horrid crags, by toppling convent crowned,[az]
The cork-trees hoar that clothe the shaggy steep,
The mountain-moss by scorching skies imbrowned,
The sunken glen, whose sunless shrubs must weep,
The tender azure[46] of the unruffled deep,
The orange tints that gild the greenest bough,
The torrents that from cliff to valley leap,[ba]
The vine on high, the willow branch below,
Mixed in one mighty scene, with varied beauty glow.

XX.

Then slowly climb the many-winding way,
And frequent turn to linger as you go,
From loftier rocks new loveliness survey,
And rest ye at "Our Lady's house of Woe;"[47][2. B. ]
Where frugal monks their little relics show,
And sundry legends to the stranger tell:
Here impious men have punished been, and lo!
Deep in yon cave Honorius long did dwell,
In hope to merit Heaven by making earth a Hell.

XXI.

And here and there, as up the crags you spring,
Mark many rude-carved crosses near the path:[48]
Yet deem not these Devotion's offering--
These are memorials frail of murderous wrath:
For wheresoe'er the shrieking victim hath
Pour'd forth his blood beneath the assassin's knife,
Some hand erects a cross of mouldering lath;
And grove and glen with thousand such are rife
Throughout this purple land, where Law secures not life. [3. B. ]

XXII.

On sloping mounds, or in the vale beneath,[49]
Are domes where whilome kings did make repair;
But now the wild flowers round them only breathe:
Yet ruined Splendour still is lingering there.
And yonder towers the Prince's palace fair:
There thou too, Vathek! England's wealthiest son,[bb][50]
Once formed thy Paradise, as not aware
When wanton Wealth her mightiest deeds hath done,[bc]
Meek Peace voluptuous lures was ever wont to shun.