Here you will find the Poem The Happy Man of poet James Thomson
He's not the happy man, to whom is given A plenteous fortune by indulgent Heaven; Whose gilded roofs on shining columns rise, And painted walls enchant the gazer's eyes; Whose table flows with hospitable cheer, And all the various bounty of the year; Whose valleys smile, whose gardens breathe the spring, Whose curved mountains bleat, and forests sing; For whom the cooling shade in summer twines, While his full cellars give their generous wines; From whose wide fields unbounded autumn pours A golden tide into his swelling stores; Whose winter laughs; for whom the liberal gales Stretch the big sheet, and toiling commerce sails; Whom yielding crowds attend, and pleasure serves; While youth, and health, and vigour string his nerves. E'en not all these, in one rich lot combined, Can make the happy man, without the mind; Where judgment sits clear-sighted, and surveys The chain of reason with unerring gaze; Where fancy lives, and to the brightening eyes, Her fairer scenes, and bolder figures rise; Where social love exerts her soft command, And lays the passions with a tender hand, Whence every virtue flows, in rival strife, And all the moral harmony of life. Nor canst thou, Dodington, this truth decline: Thine is the fortune, and the mind is thine.
