by Coleridge · Cluster: Nationalism and Patriotism · Democracy · Liberty Political Freedom
Abstract
A sonnet from the ‘Sonnets on Eminent Characters’ praising Erskine as a ‘hireless Priest’ defending British Freedom with eloquence; themes of liberty, fame surviving the tomb, and the poet’s immortalizing power.
Connections
Topoi: Poet as Prophet Motifs: Sun Themes & Concepts: Liberty Political Freedom, Immortality of Art Fame, Heroism Forms & Genres: Sonnet
Testo integrale / Full text
When British Freedom for an happier land
Spread her broad wings, that flutter’d with affright,
ERSKINE! thy voice she heard, and paus’d her flight
Sublime of hope, for dreadless thou didst stand
(Thy censer glowing with the hallow’d flame) 5
A hireless Priest before the insulted shrine,
And at her altar pour the stream divine
Of unmatch’d eloquence. Therefore thy name
Her sons shall venerate, and cheer thy breast
With blessings heaven-ward breath’d. And when the doom
Of Nature bids thee die, beyond the tomb 11
Thy light shall shine: as sunk beneath the West
Though the great Summer Sun eludes our gaze,
Still burns wide Heaven with his distended blaze.
December 1, 1794.