The Garden

by Andrew Marvell


How vainly men themselves amaze
To win the palm, the oak, or bays ;
And their uncessant labors see
Crowned from some single herb or tree,
Whose short and narrow-vergèd shade
Does prudently their toils upbraid ;
While all the flowers and trees do close
To weave the garlands of repose.

Fair Quiet, have I found thee here,
And Innocence, thy sister dear!
Mistaken long, I sought you then
In busy companies of men :
Your sacred plants, if here below,
Only among the plants will grow ;
Society is all but rude,
To this delicious solitude.

No white nor red was ever seen
So amorous as this lovely green ;
Fond lovers, cruel as their flame,
Cut in these trees their mistress' name.
Little, alas, they know or heed,
How far these beauties hers exceed!
Fair trees! wheresoe'er your barks I wound
No name shall but your own be found.

When we have run our passion's heat,
Love hither makes his best retreat :
The gods who mortal beauty chase,
Still in a tree did end their race.
Apollo hunted Daphne so,
Only that she might laurel grow,
And Pan did after Syrinx speed,
Not as a nymph, but for a reed.

What wondrous life is this I lead!
Ripe apples drop about my head ;
The luscious clusters of the vine
Upon my mouth do crush their wine ;
The nectarine and curious peach
Into my hands themselves do reach ;
Stumbling on melons as I pass,
Insnared with flowers, I fall on grass.

Meanwhile the mind, from pleasure less,
Withdraws into its happiness :
The mind, that ocean where each kind
Does straight its own resemblance find ;
Yet it creates, transcending these,
Far other worlds, and other seas ;
Annihilating all that's made
To a green thought in a green shade.

Here at the fountain's sliding foot,
Or at some fruit-tree's mossy root,
Casting the body's vest aside,
My soul into the boughs does glide :
There like a bird it sits and sings,
Then whets and combs its silver wings ;
And, till prepared for longer flight,
Waves in its plumes the various light.

Such was that happy garden-state,
While man there walked without a mate :
After a place so pure and sweet,
What other help could yet be meet!
But 'twas beyond a mortal's share
To wander solitary there :
Two paradises 'twere in one
To live in Paradise alone.

How well the skillful gard'ner drew
Of flowers and herbs this dial new ;
Where from above the milder sun
Does through a fragrant zodiac run ;
And, as it works, th' industrious bee
Computes its time as well as we.
How could such sweet and wholesome hours
Be reckoned but with herbs and flowers!

Sounds deeply embittered to me.  Man gets heart broken by a fond cruel lover, seeks solitude among trees to dwell on his pain.

The Arch-Angel stood; and, from the other hill
To their fixed station, all in bright array
The Cherubim descended; on the ground
Gliding meteorous, as evening-mist
Risen from a river o'er the marish glides,
And gathers ground fast at the labourer's heel
Homeward returning. High in front advanced,
The brandished sword of God before them blazed,
Fierce as a comet; which with torrid heat,
And vapour as the Libyan air adust,
Began to parch that temperate clime; whereat
In either hand the hastening Angel caught
Our lingering parents, and to the eastern gate
Led them direct, and down the cliff as fast
To the subjected plain; then disappeared.
They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld
Of Paradise, so late their happy seat,
Waved over by that flaming brand; the gate
With dreadful faces thronged, and fiery arms:
Some natural tears they dropt, but wiped them soon;
The world was all before them, where to choose
Their place of rest, and Providence their guide:
They, hand in hand, with wandering steps and slow,
Through Eden took their solitary way.

Milton, Paradise Lost

Book XII, final lines

At UCL Steve Fender - who moved on to be Professor in American Studies at Sussex - used to arrange day long "out loud" readings of Paradise Lost (Attendance voluntary!)

You could come & go as you pleased (this was in about 1980). They worked very well, too. And were well attended (we were an odd lot  ).

"The world was all before them" could be the epigraph to Wordsworth's Prelude.

And is quoted in one of the alternative final chapters of Dickens's Great Expectations.

Ooh, ooh, yes he did. Colleague of mine until he retired, some years ago now; although I still sometimes see him in the Chinese takeaway we obviously both frequent. Nice guy. Something sad about him, though...

Thanks for that, anty.

(I think you'll find  it's Addison's Cato, not Cairo.)

Anty, just so you know in future -


Cairo


Cato

 

Oh, I should be on the stage.

I could not dream of Oxford's spires,
Or punting up the Cam,
No May Day Balls on Magdalen Bridge,
Pronouced maudling,  God knows why.
The Isis is out of touch for me and
Simon de Montfort Uni, where the hell is that?

So my books and I, we are great friends
But sometimes we get it wrong.

I know the thing that is most uncommon,
(Envy be silent and attend)
I know a reasonable women,
Handsome and witty, yet a friend,

Not warped by passion, awed by rumour,
Nor grave through pride, or gay through folly,
An equal mixture of good humour
And sensible soft melancholy.

Has she no faults then (Envy says) sir?
Yes she has, I must aver
When all the world conspires to praise her
The woman's deaf, and does not hear.