10 Best Famous Presumption Poems

Here is a collection of the top 10 all-time best famous Presumption poems. This is a select list of the best famous Presumption poetry. Reading, writing, and enjoying famous Presumption poetry (as well as classical and contemporary poems) is a great past time. These top poems are the best examples of presumption poems.

• All Famous Presumption Poems

 Because that you are going
And never coming back
And I, however absolute,
May overlook your Track --

Because that Death is final,
However first it be,
This instant be suspended
Above Mortality --

Significance that each has lived
The other to detect
Discovery not God himself
Could now annihilate

Eternity, Presumption
The instant I perceive
That you, who were Existence
Yourself forgot to live --

The "Life that is" will then have been
A thing I never knew --
As Paradise fictitious
Until the Realm of you --

The "Life that is to be," to me,
A Residence too plain
Unless in my Redeemer's Face
I recognize your own --

Of Immortality who doubts
He may exchange with me
Curtailed by your obscuring Face
Of everything but He --

Of Heaven and Hell I also yield
The Right to reprehend
To whoso would commute this Face
For his less priceless Friend.

If "God is Love" as he admits
We think that me must be
Because he is a "jealous God"
He tells us certainly

If "All is possible with" him
As he besides concedes
He will refund us finally
Our confiscated Gods --

 "Do I believe," sayest thou, "what the masters of wisdom would teach me,
And what their followers' band boldly and readily swear?
Cannot I ever attain to true peace, excepting through knowledge,
Or is the system upheld only by fortune and law?
Must I distrust the gently-warning impulse, the precept
That thou, Nature, thyself hast in my bosom impressed,
Till the schools have affixed to the writ eternal their signet,
Till a mere formula's chain binds down the fugitive soul?
Answer me, then! for thou hast down into these deeps e'en descended,--
Out of the mouldering grave thou didst uninjured return.
Is't to thee known what within the tomb of obscure works is hidden,
Whether, yon mummies amid, life's consolations can dwell?
Must I travel the darksome road? The thought makes me tremble;
Yet I will travel that road, if 'tis to truth and to right."

Friend, hast thou heard of the golden age? Full many a story
Poets have sung in its praise, simply and touchingly sung--
Of the time when the holy still wandered over life's pathways,--
When with a maidenly shame every sensation was veiled,--
When the mighty law that governs the sun in his orbit,
And that, concealed in the bud, teaches the point how to move,
When necessity's silent law, the steadfast, the changeless,
Stirred up billows more free, e'en in the bosom of man,--
When the sense, unerring, and true as the hand of the dial,
Pointed only to truth, only to what was eternal?

Then no profane one was seen, then no initiate was met with,
And what as living was felt was not then sought 'mongst the dead;
Equally clear to every breast was the precept eternal,
Equally hidden the source whence it to gladden us sprang;
But that happy period has vanished! And self-willed presumption
Nature's godlike repose now has forever destroyed.
Feelings polluted the voice of the deities echo no longer,
In the dishonored breast now is the oracle dumb.
Save in the silenter self, the listening soul cannot find it,
There does the mystical word watch o'er the meaning divine;
There does the searcher conjure it, descending with bosom unsullied;
There does the nature long-lost give him back wisdom again.
If thou, happy one, never hast lost the angel that guards thee,
Forfeited never the kind warnings that instinct holds forth;
If in thy modest eye the truth is still purely depicted;
If in thine innocent breast clearly still echoes its call;
If in thy tranquil mind the struggles of doubt still are silent,
If they will surely remain silent forever as now;
If by the conflict of feelings a judge will ne'er be required;
If in its malice thy heart dims not the reason so clear,
Oh, then, go thy way in all thy innocence precious!
Knowledge can teach thee in naught; thou canst instruct her in much!
Yonder law, that with brazen staff is directing the struggling,
Naught is to thee. What thou dost, what thou mayest will is thy law,
And to every race a godlike authority issues.
What thou with holy hand formest, what thou with holy mouth speakest,
Will with omnipotent power impel the wondering senses;
Thou but observest not the god ruling within thine own breast,
Not the might of the signet that bows all spirits before thee;
Simple and silent thou goest through the wide world thou hast won.

 Each Life Converges to some Centre --
Expressed -- or still --
Exists in every Human Nature
A Goal --

Embodied scarcely to itself -- it may be --
Too fair
For Credibility's presumption
To mar --

Adored with caution -- as a Brittle Heaven --
To reach
Were hopeless, as the Rainbow's Raiment
To touch --

Yet persevered toward -- sure -- for the Distance --
How high --
Unto the Saint's slow diligence --
The Sky --

Ungained -- it may be -- by a Life's low Venture --
But then --
Eternity enable the endeavoring
Again.

 Sprawl is the quality
of the man who cut down his Rolls-Royce
into a farm utility truck, and sprawl
is what the company lacked when it made repeated efforts
to buy the vehicle back and repair its image. 

Sprawl is doing your farm work by aeroplane, roughly,
or driving a hitchhiker that extra hundred miles home.
It is the rococo of being your own still centre.
It is never lighting cigars with ten dollar notes:
that's idiot ostentation and murder of starving people.
Nor can it be bought with the ash of million dollar deeds. 

Sprawl lengthens the legs; it trains greyhounds on liver and beer.
Sprawl almost never says, Why not?, with palms comically raised
nor can it be dressed for, not even in running shoes worn
with mink and a nose ring. That is Society. That's Style.
Sprawl is more like the thirteenth banana in a dozen
or anyway the fourteenth. 

Sprawl is Hank Stamper in Never Give an Inch
bisecting an obstructive official's desk with a chain saw.
Not harming the official. Sprawl is never brutal,
though it's often intransigent. Sprawl is never Simon de Montfort
at a town-storming: Kill them all! God will know His own.
Knowing the man's name this was said to might be sprawl. 

Sprawl occurs in art. The fifteenth to twenty-first
lines in a sonnet, for example. And in certain paintings.
I have sprawl enough to have forgotten which paintings.
Turner's glorious Burning of the Houses of Parliament
comes to mind, a doubling bannered triumph of sprawl -
except he didn't fire them. 

Sprawl gets up the noses of many kinds of people
(every kind that comes in kinds) whose futures don't include it.
Some decry it as criminal presumption, silken-robed Pope Alexander
dividing the new world between Spain and Portugal.
If he smiled in petto afterwards, perhaps the thing did have sprawl. 

Sprawl is really classless, though. It is John Christopher Frederick Murray
asleep in his neighbours' best bed in spurs and oilskins,
but not having thrown up:
sprawl is never Calum, who, in the loud hallway of our house
reinvented the Festoon. Rather
it's Beatrice Miles going twelve hundred ditto in a taxi,
No Lewd Advances, no Hitting Animals, no Speeding,
on the proceeds of her two-bob-a-sonnet Shakespeare readings.
An image of my country. And would thatit were more so. 

No, sprawl is full gloss murals on a council-house wall.
Sprawl leans on things. It is loose-limbed in its mind.
Reprimanded and dismissed,
it listens with a grin and one boot up on the rail
of possibility. It may have to leave the Earth.
Being roughly Christian, it scratches the other cheek
And thinks it unlikely. Though people have been shot for sprawl.

 Alone and in a Circumstance
Reluctant to be told
A spider on my reticence
Assiduously crawled

And so much more at Home than I
Immediately grew
I felt myself a visitor
And hurriedly withdrew

Revisiting my late abode
With articles of claim
I found it quietly assumed
As a Gymnasium
Where Tax asleep and Title off
The inmates of the Air
Perpetual presumption took
As each were special Heir --
If any strike me on the street
I can return the Blow --

If any take my property
According to the Law
The Statute is my Learned friend
But what redress can be
For an offense nor here nor there
So not in Equity --
That Larceny of time and mind
The marrow of the Day
By spider, or forbid it Lord
That I should specify.

 O GOWDIE, terror o’ the whigs,
Dread o’ blackcoats and rev’rend wigs!
Sour Bigotry, on her last legs,
 Girns an’ looks back,
Wishing the ten Egyptian plagues
 May seize you quick.


Poor gapin’, glowrin’ Superstition!
Wae’s me, she’s in a sad condition:
Fye: bring Black Jock, 1 her state physician,
 To see her water;
Alas, there’s ground for great suspicion
She’ll ne’er get better.


Enthusiasm’s past redemption,
Gane in a gallopin’ consumption:
Not a’ her quacks, wi’ a’ their gumption,
 Can ever mend her;
Her feeble pulse gies strong presumption,
 She’ll soon surrender.


Auld Orthodoxy lang did grapple,
For every hole to get a stapple;
But now she fetches at the thrapple,
 An’ fights for breath;
Haste, gie her name up in the chapel, 2
 Near unto death.


It’s you an’ Taylor 3 are the chief
To blame for a’ this black mischief;
But, could the L—d’s ain folk get leave,
 A toom tar barrel
An’ twa red peats wad bring relief,
 And end the quarrel.


For me, my skill’s but very sma’,
An’ skill in prose I’ve nane ava’;
But quietlins-wise, between us twa,
 Weel may you speed!
And tho’ they sud your sair misca’,
 Ne’er fash your head.


E’en swinge the dogs, and thresh them sicker!
The mair they squeel aye chap the thicker;
And still ’mang hands a hearty bicker
 O’ something stout;
It gars an owthor’s pulse beat quicker,
 And helps his wit.


There’s naething like the honest nappy;
Whare’ll ye e’er see men sae happy,
Or women sonsie, saft an’ sappy,
 ’Tween morn and morn,
As them wha like to taste the drappie,
 In glass or horn?


I’ve seen me dazed upon a time,
I scarce could wink or see a styme;
Just ae half-mutchkin does me prime,—
 Ought less is little—
Then back I rattle on the rhyme,
 As gleg’s a whittle.


 Note 1. The Rev. J. Russell, Kilmarnock.—R. B. [back]
Note 2. Mr. Russell’s Kirk.—R. B. [back]
Note 3. Dr. Taylor of Norwich.—R. B. [back]

 I Sing the Man that never Equal knew, 
Whose Mighty Arms all Asia did subdue, 
Whose Conquests through the spacious World do ring, 
That City-Raser, King-destroying King, 
Who o're the Warlike Macedons did Reign, 
And worthily the Name of Great did gain. 
This is the Prince (if Fame you will believe,
To ancient Story any credit give.) 
Who when the Globe of Earth he had subdu'd, 
With Tears the easie Victory pursu'd; 
Because that no more Worlds there were to win, 
No further Scene to act his Glorys in. 
 Ah that some pitying Muse would now inspire
My frozen style with a Poetique fire, 
And Raptures worthy of his Matchless Fame, 
Whose Deeds I sing, whose never fading Name 

Long as the world shall fresh and deathless last, 
No less to future Ages, then the past. 
Great my presumption is, I must confess, 
But if I thrive, my Glory's ne're the less; 
Nor will it from his Conquests derogate
A Female Pen his Acts did celebrate. 
If thou O Muse wilt thy assistance give, 
Such as made Naso and great Maro live, 
With him whom Melas fertile Banks did bear, 
Live, though their Bodies dust and ashes are; 
Whose Laurels were not fresher, than their Fame
Is now, and will for ever be the same. 
If the like favour thou wilt grant to me, 
O Queen of Verse, I'll not ungrateful be, 
My choicest hours to thee I'll Dedicate, 
'Tis thou shalt rule, 'tis thou shalt be my Fate. 
But if Coy Goddess thou shalt this deny, 
And from my humble suit disdaining fly, 
I'll stoop and beg no more, since I know this, 
Writing of him, I cannot write amiss: 
His lofty Deeds will raise each feeble line, 
And God-like Acts will make my Verse Divine. 

'Twas at the time the golden Sun doth rise, 
And with his Beams enlights the azure skies, 
When lo a Troop in Silver Arms drew near, 
The glorious Sun did nere so bright appear; 
Dire Scarlet Plumes adorn'd their haughty Crests, 
And crescent Shields did shade their shining Brests; 
Down from their shoulders hung a Panthers Hide, 
A Bow and Quiver ratled by their side; 
Their hands a knotty well try'd Speare did bear, 
Jocund they seem'd, and quite devoyd of fear. 
These warlike Virgins were, that do reside
Near Thermodons smooth Banks and verdant side, 
The Plains of Themiscyre their Birth do boast, 
Thalestris now did head the beauteous Host; 
She emulating that Illustrious Dame, 
Who to the aid of Troy and Priam came, 
And her who the Retulian Prince did aid, 
Though dearly both for their Assistance paid. 
But fear she scorn'd, nor the like fate did dread, 
Her Host she often to the field had lead, 
As oft in Triumph had return'd again, 
Glory she only sought for all her pain. 

This Martial Queen had heard how lowdly fame, 
Eccho'd our Conquerors redoubted Name, 
Her Soul his Conduct and his Courage fir'd, 
To see the Hero she so much admir'd; 
And to Hyrcania for this cause she went, 
Where Alexander (wholly then intent
On Triumphs and such Military sport)
At Truce with War held both his Camp and Court. 
And while before the Town she did attend
Her Messengers return, she saw ascend
A cloud of Dust, that cover'd all the skie, 
And still at every pause there stroke her eye. 
The interrupted Beams of Burnisht Gold,
As dust the Splendour hid, or did unfold; 
Loud Neighings of the Steeds, and Trumpets sound
Fill'd all the Air, and eccho'd from the ground: 
The gallant Greeks with a brisk March drew near, 
And their great Chief did at their Head appear. 
And now come up to th'Amazonian Band, 
They made a Hault and a respectful Stand: 
And both the Troops (with like amazement strook) 
Did each on other with deep silence look. 

Th'Heroick Queen (whose high pretence to War
Cancell'd the bashful Laws and nicer Bar
Of Modesty, which did her Sex restrain)
First boldly did advance before her Train, 
And thus she spake. All but a God in Name, 
And that a debt Time owes unto thy Fame. 

This was the first Essay of this young Lady in Poetry, but finding the Task she had undertaken hard, she laid it by till Practice and more time should make her equal to so great a Work.

 Dear Lord! accept a sinful heart,
Which of itself complains,
And mourns, with much and frequent smart,
The evil it contains.

There fiery seeds of anger lurk,
Which often hurt my frame;
And wait but for the tempter's work,
To fan them to a flame.

Legality holds out a bribe
To purchase life from Thee;
And Discontent would fain prescribe
How Thou shalt deal with me.

While Unbelief withstands Thy grace,
And puts the mercy by,
Presumption, with a brow of brass,
Says, "Give me, or I die!"

How eager are my thoughts to roam,
In quest of what they love!
But ah! when duty calls them home,
How heavily they move!

Oh, cleanse me in a Saviour's blood,
Transform me by Thy power,
And make me Thy beloved abode,
And let me roam no more.

When first of wise old Johnson taught,
My youthful mind its homage brought,
And made the pond'rous crusty sage
The object of a noble rage.
Nor did I think (How dense we are!)
That any day, however far,
Would find me holding, unrepelled,
The place that Doctor Johnson held!
But change has come and time has moved,
And now, applauded, unreproved,
I hold, with pardonable pride,
The place that Johnson occupied.
Conceit! Presumption! What is this?
You surely read my words amiss;
Like Johnson I,—a man of mind!
How could you ever be so blind?
No. At the ancient "Cheshire Cheese,"
Blown hither by some vagrant breeze,
To dignify my shallow wit,
In Doctor Johnson's seat I sit!

 Presumption and despair; or, Satan's various temptations.

I hate the tempter and his charms,
I hate his flatt'ring breath;
The serpent takes a thousand forms
To cheat our souls to death.

He feeds our hopes with airy dreams,
Or kills with slavish fear;
And holds us still in wide extremes,
Presumption or despair.

Now he persuades, "How easy 'tis
To walk the road to heav'n;"
Anon he swells our sins, and cries,
"They cannot be forgiv'n."

[He bids young sinners "yet forbear
To think of God, or death;
For prayer and devotion are
But melancholy breath."

He tells the aged, "they must die,
"And 'tis too late to pray;
In vain for mercy now they cry,
For they have lost their day."]

Thus he supports his cruel throne
By mischief and deceit,
And drags the sons of Adam down
To darkness and the pit.

Almighty God, cut short his power,
Let him in darkness dwell
And that he vex the earth no more,
Confine him down to hell.