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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=359065" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Hymn To The Patriarchs</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">OR OF THE BEGINNINGS OF THE HUMAN RACE.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Illustrious fathers of the human race,<br>Of you, the song of your afflicted sons<br>Will chant the praise; of you, more dear, by far,<br>Unto the Great Disposer of the stars,<br>Who were not born to wretchedness, like ours.<br>Immedicable woes, a life of tears,<br>The silent tomb, eternal night, to find<br>More sweet, by far, than the ethereal light,<br>These things were not by heaven's gracious law<br>Imposed on you. If ancient legends speak<br>Of sins of yours, that brought calamity<br>Upon the human race, and fell disease,<br>Alas, the sins more terrible, by far,<br>Committed by your children, and their souls<br>More restless, and with mad ambition fixed,<br>Against them roused the wrath of angry gods,<br>The hand of all-sustaining Nature armed,<br>By them so long neglected and despised.<br>Then life became a burden and a curse,<br>And every new-born babe a thing abhorred,<br>And hell and chaos reigned upon the earth.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Thou first the day, and thou the shining lights<br>Of the revolving stars didst see, the fields,<br>And their new flocks and herds, O leader old<br>And father of the human family!<br>The wandering air that o'er the meadows played,<br>When smote the rocks, and the deserted vales,<br>The torrent, rustling headlong from the Alps,<br>With sound, till then, unheard; and o'er the sites<br>Of future nations, noisy cities, yet unknown<br>To fame, a peace profound, mysterious reigned;<br>And o'er the unploughed hills, in silence, rose<br>The ray of Phoebus, and the golden moon.<br>O world, how happy in thy loneliness,<br>Of crimes and of disasters ignorant!<br>Oh, how much wretchedness Fate had in store<br>For thy poor race, unhappy father, what<br>A series vast of terrible events!<br>Behold, the fields, scarce tilled, with blood are stained,<br>A brother's blood, in sudden frenzy shed;<br>And now, alas, first hears the gentle air<br>The whirring of the fearful wings of Death.<br>The trembling fratricide, a fugitive,<br>The lonely shades avoids; in every blast<br>That sweeps the groves, a voice of wrath he hears.<br>_He_ the first city builds, abode and realm<br>Of wasting cares; repentance desperate,<br>Heart-sick, and groaning, thus unites and binds<br>Together blind and sinful souls, and first<br>A refuge offers unto mutual guilt.<br>The wicked hand now scorns the crooked plough;<br>The sweat of honest labor is despised;<br>Now sloth possession of the threshold takes;<br>The sluggish frames their native vigor lose;<br>The minds in hopeless indolence are sunk;<br>And slavery, the crowning curse of all,<br>Degrades and crushes poor humanity.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And thou from heaven's wrath, and ocean's waves,<br>That bellowed round the cloud-capped mountain-tops,<br>The sinful brood didst save; thou, unto whom,<br>From the dark air and wave-encumbered hills,<br>The white dove brought the sign of hope renewed,<br>And sinking in the west, the shipwrecked sun,<br>His bright rays darting through the angry clouds,<br>The dark sky painted with the lovely bow.<br>The race restored, to earth returned, begins anew<br>The same career of wickedness and lust,<br>With their attendant ills. Audacious man<br>Defies the threats of the avenging sea,<br>And to new shores and to new stars repeats<br>The same sad tale of infamy and woe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And now of thee I think, the just and brave,<br>The Father of the faithful, and the sons<br>Thy honored name that bore. Of thee I speak,<br>Whom, sitting, thoughtful, in the noontide shade,<br>Before thy humble cottage, near the banks,<br>That gave thy flocks both rest and nourishment,<br>The minds ethereal of celestial guests<br>With blessings greeted; and of thee, O son<br>Of wise Rebecca, how at eventide,<br>In Aran's valley sweet, and by the well,<br>Where happy swains in friendly converse met,<br>Thou didst with Laban's daughter fall in love;<br>Love, that to exile long, and suffering,<br>And to the odious yoke of servitude,<br>Thy patient soul a willing martyr led.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oh, surely once,--for not with idle tales<br>And shadows, the Aonian song, and voice<br>Of Fame, the eager list'ners feed,--once was<br>This wretched earth more friendly to our race,<br>Was more beloved and dear, and golden flew<br>The days, that now so laden are with care.<br>Not that the milk, in waves of purest white,<br>Gushed from the rocks, and flowed along the vales;<br>Or that the tigers mingled with the sheep,<br>To the same fold were led; or shepherd-boys<br>With playful wolves would frolic at the spring;<br>But of its own lot ignorant, and all<br>The sufferings that were in store, devoid<br>Of care it lived: a soft, illusive veil<br>Of error hid the stern realities,<br>The cruel laws of heaven and of fate.<br>Life glided on, with cheerful hope content;<br>And tranquil, sought the haven of its rest.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">So lives, in California's forests vast,<br>A happy race, whose life-blood is not drained<br>By pallid care, whose limbs are not by fierce<br>Disease consumed: the woods their food, their homes<br>The hollow rock, the streamlet of the vale<br>Its waters furnishes, and, unforeseen,<br>Dark death upon them steals. Ah, how unarmed,<br>Wise Nature's happy votaries, are ye,<br>Against our impious audacity!<br>Our fierce, indomitable love of gain<br>Your shores, your caves, your quiet woods invades;<br>Your minds corrupts, your bodies enervates;<br>And happiness, a naked fugitive,<br>Before it drives, to earth's remotest bounds.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Count+Giacomo+Leopardi">Count Giacomo Leopardi</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=359065" data-title="Hymn To The Patriarchs de Count Giacomo Leopardi" data-description="OR OF THE BEGINNINGS OF THE HUMAN RACE.

Illustrious fathers of the human race,
Of you, the song of your afflicted sons
Will chant the praise; of you, more dear, by far,
Unto the Great Disposer of the stars,
Who were not born to wretchedness, like..."></div>
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