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The Venezuelan-Chilean poet, jurist, philosopher, philologist and educator, Andres Bello (1781-1865), who served the cause of South American independence, also extolled the natural beauty of the continent in his poetry, exemplified by the following poem about the Bio-Bio river in Chile. To the Bio-Bio Andres Bello Blest were he, O Bio-Bio! Who could dwell forevermore In a deep grove, cool and shady, Upon thine enchanted shore! Just a lowly thatched-roofed cottage Where thy limpid waters are seen Pouring their calm flood in silence Amid foliage fresh and green; Where, instead of shifting changes In the fickle things of state, Wind-stirred oaks and maitens murmur, And the forest peace is great; Where the bird amid the branches, In the early dawning gray, Sings its untaught, artless music, Greeting thus the new-born day. In that humble thatched-roof cottage, Oh, how happy were my lot, In the peace that nothing troubles, Envied not and envying not! This to me in truth were sweeter Than the Babel wild and loud Where in chase of a chimera All are rushing in a crowd; Where dark treachery and falsehood Near the quaking altar stay That the people's favour raises To the idols of a day. Sweet repose, most blissful quiet, Earthly paradise divine! Has the palm of war or wisdom Worth which can outrival thine? Truth I love, not adulation - Truth all unadorned and plain, Not the clamorous applauses That are raised in Fortune's train. Growing old, for that false treasure I would cease my soul to fret - Say 'Farewell to disappointments! The forgetful I forget. 'Others call excitement pleasure, Madly seeking fame or pelf; I in earth's most hidden corner Wish to live now for myself.'
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