[Page 269]

ODE TO HORROR.

IN THE ALLEGORIC, DESCRIPTIVE, ALLITERATIVE, EPITHETICAL, FANTASTIC, HYPERBOLICAL, AND DIABOLICAL STYLE OF OUR MODERN ODE-WRIGHTS, AND MONODY-MONGERS.

1 O GODDESS of the gloomy scene,
2 Of shadowy shapes thou black-brow'd queen.
3 Thy tresses dark with ivy crown'd,
4 On yonder mouldering abby found;
5 Oft wont from charnels damp and dim
6 To call the sheeted spectre grim,
7 While as his loose chains loudly clink,
8 Thou add'st a length to every link:
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9 O thou, that lov'st at eve to seek
10 The pensive-pacing pilgrim meek,
11 And set'st before his shuddering eyes
12 Strange forms, and fiends of giant-size,
13 As wildly works thy wizzard will,
14 Till fear-struck Fancy has her fill:
15 Dark power, whose magic might prevails
16 O'er hermit-rocks, and fairy-vales;
17 O Goddess, erst by
x Spenser's Fairy Queen, b. 3. canto 12.
Spenser view'd,
18 What time th' enchanter vile embrued,
19 His hands in Florimel's pure heart,
20 Till loos'd by steel-clad Britomart:
21 O thou that erst on Fancy's wing
22 Didst terror-trembling
y Gierus. Liberat. b. 14.
Tasso bring,
23 To groves where kept damn'd Furies dire
24 Their blue-tipt battlements of fire:
25 Thou that thro' many a darksome pine,
26 O'er the rugged rock recline,
27 Did'st wake the hollow-whispering breeze
28 With care-consumed Eloise:
29 O thou, with whom in chearless cell,
30 The midnight-clock pale pris'ners tell;
31 O haste thee, mild Miltonic maid,
32 From yonder yew's sequester'd shade;
33 More bright than all the fabled Nine,
34 Teach me to breathe the solemn line!
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35 O bid my well-rang'd numbers rise
36 Pervious to none but Attic eyes;
37 O give the strain that madness moves,
38 Till every starting sense approves!
39 What felt the Gallic
z I do not remember that any poetical use has been made of this story.
traveller,
40 When far in Arab-desert drear
41 He found within the catacomb,
42 Alive, the terrors of a tomb?
43 While many a mummy thro' the shade,
44 In hieroglyphic stole array'd,
45 Seem'd to uprear the mystic head,
46 And trace the gloom with ghostly tread;
47 Thou heardst him pour the stifled groan,
48 Horror! his soul was all thy own!
49 O mother of the fire-clad thought,
50 O haste thee from thy grave-like grot!
51 (What time the witch perform'd her rite)
52 Sprung from th' embrace of Taste and Night!
53 O queen! that erst did'st thinly spread
54 The willowy leaves o'er
a See Isis, an Elegy.
Isis' head,
55 And to her meek mien did'st dispense
56 Woe's most awful negligence;
57 What time, in cave, with visage pale,
58 She told her elegiac tale:
59 O thou! whom wandering Warton saw,
60 Amaz'd with more than youthful awe,
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61 As by the pale moon's glimmering gleam
62 He mus'd his melancholy theme
b See The Pleasures of Melancholy, a poem.
:
63 O curfeu-loving goddess, haste!
64 O waft me to some Scythian waste,
65 Where, in Gothic solitude,
66 'Mid prospects most sublimely rude,
67 Beneath a rough rock's gloomy chasm,
68 Thy sister sits, Enthusiasm:
69 Let me with her, in magic trance,
70 Hold most delirious dalliance;
71 Till I, thy pensive votary,
72 Horror, look madly wild like thee;
73 Until I gain true transport's shore,
74 And life's retiring scene is o'er;
75 Aspire to some more azure sky,
76 Remote from dim mortality;
77 At length, recline the fainting head,
78 In Druid-dreams dissolv'd and dead.

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Title (in Source Edition): ODE TO HORROR. IN THE ALLEGORIC, DESCRIPTIVE, ALLITERATIVE, EPITHETICAL, FANTASTIC, HYPERBOLICAL, AND DIABOLICAL STYLE OF OUR MODERN ODE-WRIGHTS, AND MONODY-MONGERS.
Author: Thomas Warton
Themes: poetry; literature; writing; fear
Genres: ode
References: DMI 22202

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Pearch, G. A collection of poems in four volumes. By several hands. Vol. IV. [The second edition]. London: printed for G. Pearch, 1770, pp. 269-272. 4v. ; 8⁰. (ESTC T116245; DMI 1137; OTA K093079.004) (Page images digitized from a copy in the Bodleian Library [(OC) 280 o.791].)

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The text has been typographically modernized, but without any silent modernization of spelling, capitalization, or punctuation. The source of the text is given and all editorial interventions have been recorded in textual notes. Based on the electronic text originally produced by the TCP project, this ECPA text has been edited to conform to the recommendations found in Level 5 of the Best Practices for TEI in Libraries version 4.0.0.