TO TIME PAST. WRITTEN DEC. 1772. Anna Seward Alexander Huber Editor Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford
Broad Street Oxford OX1 3BG UK
Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive
Taylor Institution Library St Giles' Oxford OX1 3NA UK info@eighteenthcenturypoetry.org https://www.eighteenthcenturypoetry.org/
Oxford This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. T96723 Seward, Anna, 1742-1809. Llangollen Vale, with Other Poems. London Printed for G. Sael, No. 192, Strand 1796 pp. 41-42.

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TO TIME PAST . WRITTEN DEC. 1772. RETURN , blest years ! — when not the jocund Spring , Luxuriant Summer , nor the amber hours Calm Autumn gives , my heart invok'd to bring Joys , whose rich balm o'er all the bosom pours ; When ne'er I wish'd might grace the closing day One tint purpureal , or one golden ray ; When the loud Storms , that desolate the bowers , Found dearer welcome than Favonian gales , And Winter's bare , bleak fields , than Summer's flowery Vales ! Yet , not to deck pale hours with vain parade Beneath the blaze of wide-illumin'd Dome ; Not for the bounding Dance ; — not to pervade , And charm the sense with music ; — nor , as roam The mimic Passions o'er theatric scene , To laugh , or weep ; — O ! not for these , I ween , But for delights that made the heart their home , Was the grey night-frost on the sounding plain More than the Sun invok'd , that gilds the grassy lane . Yes , for the joys that trivial joys excell , My lov'd HONORA MISS HONORA SNEYD , to whom the gallant , and unfortunate MAJOR ANDRE was so unalienably attached . See the Author's MONODY on that Gentleman . , did we hail the gloom Of dim November's eve ; — and as it fell , And the bright fires shone cheerful round the room , Dropt the warm curtains with no tardy hand ; And felt our spirits , and our hearts expand , Listening their steps , who still , where'er they come , Make the keen stars , that glaze the settled snows , More than the Sun invok'd , when first he tints the rose . Affection , — Friendship , — Sympathy , — your throne Is Winter's glowing hearth ; — and ye were ours , Thy smile , HONORA , made them all our own . — Where are they now ? — alas ! their choicest powers Faded at thy retreat ; — for thou art gone , And many a dark , long Eve I sigh alone , In thrill'd remembrance of the vanish'd hours , When storms were dearer than the balmy gales , And Winter's bare bleak fields than green luxuriant vales .