Delaware state journal. [volume] (Wilmington, Del.) 1870-1883, 1883-10-25
HENRY FIELDING.
Austin Dobson.


Verses read at the unwilling, by Mr.. j. r.
Lowell, of Miss Margaret Thomas bust in the
shire Hall, Taunton, September 4th, 1888.
Not from the ranks OF those we call
Philosopher or Admiral
Neither as Locke WAS, nor as Blake,
Is that great genius TOR whose sake
We Keep this Autumn festival.
And yet in one sense, too, was he
A soldier-of humanity;
And, surely, philosophic mind
belonged to him whose brain designed
That teeming Comic Epos where,
As in Cervantes and Moliere,
JoStles the medley of mankind
Our English novels pioneer
His was the eye that first saw clear
How, not in natures half etfaced
by can't OF fashion and of iaste,-
Not in the circles of the great.
nt-bloOded and exanimate,-
Lay the true field OF Jest and within,
Which we to-day reap after him.
No Tho stepped lower down and took,
The piebald people for his book
All, what a wealth of life there is
In that rich, EASY page of his
What store and stock of common sense,
Wit, laughter, lore, experienced
How his Keen satire flashes through,
And cuts sophistry In twol
How his ironlc lightning plays
Around the rogue and all his ways
All, how he knots his lash to see
That ancient cloak, hypocIisy
Whose are the characters that give
Snch round reality that live
With such full pulse? Fair Sophy yet
1arols 'St George" at the spinet;
We see Amelia cooking still
That supper for the recreant viii;
We hear squire Westerns headlonts tones
Bawling "Wut ha ?-wut ha ?" to Joaes.
Are they not present now to us
The parson with his Eschylus?
hts
Partridge and bath, and Harrison p
Are they not breathing, moving-all
The motley merry carnival
That Fielding kept, In days agone?
he was the first who dared 10 draw
Mankind the mixture that he saw;
Not wholly good nor ill, but both
With tine intricacies of growth.
He pulled the wraps of flesh apart,
And showed the working human heart,
he scorned to drape the truthful nude
Mith smooth, decords patitude!
lie was too frank, maybe; and dared
Toe boldly. Those whose thoughts he tafet
Writhed in the ruthless grasp that brought
Into the light their secret though.
Therefore the Tartutfe. throng who say
"Couvfez ce sein," aud look that way
Therefore the priests of SENTIMENT
Rose on him with their garments rent.
Therefore the gadtiy swarm, whose sting,
Plies ever round some generous thing,
Buzzed the old bills and tavern-scores,
Old OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES and "hertofores -
Then, from that jumbled record-list,
Made him his own Apologist.
And was he Nay, let who has known
Nor youth nor error cast the stone!
II to have sense of joy and pain
Too keen,- ito rise, to fall again,
70 live TOO much,--be sin, why, then
This was no phoenix among meni
But those who turn that later page,
The journal of his middle-age,
Watch him serene In either fate,-
Philanthropist and magistrate
Watch him as husband, father, friend,
faithful, and petient to the end;
Grieying, as cen the brave may grieve,
But for the loved ones he must leave
These will adnit-if any can
That meath the green Estrella trees,
No artist merely, but Man,
Wrought on our noblest island-plan,
Sleeps with the alien Portuguese.