Classic Poem

The Time of Gold

Time was, and that was termed the time of Gold,
When world and time were young, that now are old
(When quiet Saturn swayed the mace of lead,
And pride was yet unborn, and yet unbred).
Time was, that whiles the autumn fall did last,
Our hungry sires gaped for the falling mast of the Dodonian oaks.
Could no unhusked acorn leave the tree,
But there was challenge made whose it might be.
And if some nice and lickerous appetite
Desired more dainty dish of rare delight,
They scaled the stored crab with clasped knee,
Till they had sated their delicious eye;
Or searched the hopeful thicks of hedgy rows,
For briary berries, or haws, or sourer sloes;
Or when they meant to fare the fin'st of all,
They licked oak-leaves besprent with honey fall.
As for the thrice three-angled beech-nut shell,
Or chestnut's armed husk, and hid kernell,
No squire durst touch, the law would not afford,
Kept for the Court, and for the King's own board.
Their royal plate was clay, or wood, or stone:
The vulgar, save his hand, else had he none.
Their only cellar was the neighbour brook;
None did for better care, for better look.
Was then no plaining of the brewer's scape,
Nor greedy vintner mixed the strained grape.
The King's pavilion was the grassy green,
Under safe shelter of the shady treen.
Under each bank men laid their limbs along,
Not wishing any ease, not fearing wrong;
Clad with their own, as they were made of old,
Not fearing shame, not feeling any cold.
But when, by Ceres' housewifery and pain,
Men learned to bury the reviving grain,
And father Janus taught the new-found vine
Rise on the elm, with many a friendly twine,
And base desire bade men to delven low,
For needless metals, then 'gan mischief grow.
Then farewell, fairest age, the world's best days,
Thriving in ill as it in age decays.
Then crept in pride, and peevish covetise,
And men grew greedy, discordous and nice.
Now man, that erst hail-fellow was with beast,
Wox on to ween himself a god at least.
No airy fowl can take so high a flight,
Though she her daring wings in clouds have dight;
No fish can dive so deep in yielding sea,
Though Thetis' self should swear her safety;
Nor fearful beast can dig his cave so low,
All could he further than Earth's centre go;
As that the air, the earth, or ocean,
Should shield them from the gorge of greedy man.
Hath utmost Ind aught better than his own?
Then utmost Ind is near, and rife to gon.
O Nature! was the world ordained for nought,
But fill man's maw, and feed man's idle thought?
Thy grandsire's words savoured of thrifty leeks,
Or manly garlic; but thy furnace reeks
Hot steams of wine, and can aloof descry
The drunken draughts of sweet autumnity.
They naked went; or clad in ruder hide,
Or home-spun russet, void of foreign pride;
But thou canst mask in garish gaudery,
To suit a fool's far-fetched livery.
A French head joined to neck Italian;
Thy thighs from Germany, and breast fro Spain;
An Englishman in none, a fool in all,
Many in one, and one in severall.
Then men were men, but now the greater part
Beasts are in life, and women are in heart.
Good Saturn self, that homely emperor,
In proudest pomp was not so clad of yore,
As is the under-groom of the ostlery,
Husbanding it in work-day yeomanry.
Lo! the long date of those expired days,
Which the inspired Merlin's word foresays:
" When dunghill peasants shall be dight as kings,
Then one confusion another brings."
Then farewell, fairest age, the world's best days,
Thriving in ill, as it in age decays.