The heart of man, for such a task too frail,
When most relied on, is most sure to fail;
And, summoned to partake its fellow's wo,
Starts from its office, like a broken bow.
Votaries of business, and of pleasure prove
Faithless alike in friendship and in love.
Retired from all the circles of the gay,
And all the crowds, that bustle life away,
To scenes, where competition, envy, strife,
Beget no thunder-clouds to trouble life,
Let me, the charge of some good angel, find
One, who has known, and has escaped mankind;
Polite, yet virtuous, who has brought away
The manners, not the morals of the day:
With him, perhaps with her, (for men have known
No firmer friendships than the fair have shown,)
Let me enjoy, in some unthought-of spot,
All former friends forgiven, and forgot,
Down to the close of life's fast fading scene,
Union of hearts, without a flaw between.
"Tis grace, 'tis bounty, and it calls for praise;
If God give health, that sunshine of our days!
And if he add, a blessing shared by few,
Content of heart, more praises still are due-
But if he grant a friend, that boon possessed,
Indeed is treasure, and crowns all the rest;
And giving one, whose heart is in the skies,
Born from above, and made divinely wise,
He gives, what bankrupt nature never can,
Whose noblest coin is light and brittle man,
Gold, purer far than Ophir ever knew,
A soul, an image of himself, and therefore true.
HERE Johnson lies-a sage by all allowed;
Whom to have bred, may well make England proud;
Whose prose was eloquence, by wisdom taught
The graceful vehicle of virtuous thought;
Whose verse may claim-grave, masculine, and strong,
Superior praise to the mere poet's song;
Who many a noble gift from Heaven possessed,
And faith at last, alone worth all the rest.
O man, immortal by a double prize,
By fame on earth-by glory in the skies!
TO MISS C—, ON HER BIRTH-DAY.
How many between east and west,
Disgrace their parent earth,
Whose deeds constrain us to detest
The day that gave them birth!
Not so when Stella's natal morn
Revolving months restore,
We can rejoice that she was born,
And wish her born once more.
ADDRESSED TO LADY HESKETH.
THIS cap, that so stately appears,
With ribbon-bound tassel on high,
Which seems by the crest that it rears
Ambitious of brushing the sky :
This cap to my cousin I owe,
She gave it, and gave me beside,
Wreathed into an elegant bow,
The ribbon with which it is tied.
This wheel-footed studying chair,
Contrived both for toil and repose,
Wide elbowed and wadded with hair,
In which I both scribble and doze,
Bright studded to dazzle the eyes,.
And rival in lustre of that
In which, or astronomy lies,
Fair Cassiopeia sat:
These carpets, so soft to the foot,
Caledonia's traffic and pride,
O spare them ye knights of the boot,
Escaped from a cross-country-ride.
This table and mirror within,
Secure from collision and dust,
At which I oft shave cheek and chin,
And periwig nicely adjust:
This moveable structure of shelves,
For its beauty admired and its use,
And charged with octavos and twelves,
The gayest I had to produce;
Where, flaming in scarlet and gold,
My poems enchanted I view,
And hope, in due time, to behold
My Iliad and Odyssey too;
This china, that decks the alcove,
Which here people call a buffet,
But what the gods call it above,
Has ne'er been revealed to us yet;
These curtains, that keep the room warm
Or cool, as the season demands,
These stoves that for pattern and form,
Seem the labour of Mulciber's hands:
All these are not half that I owe
To one from her earliest youth To me ever ready to show
Benignity, friendship, and truth: For time the destroyer declared
And foe of our perishing kind,
If even her face he has spared,
Much less could he alter her mind.
Thus compassed about with the goods
And chattels of leisure and ease,
I indulge my poetical moods
In many such fancies as these ;
And fancies I fear they will seem—
Poets' goods are not often so fine;
The poets will swear that I dream,
When I sing of the splendour of mine.
WHEN a bar of pure silver, or Ingot of gold,
Is sent to be flatted, or wrought into length,
It is passed between cylinders often and rolled
In an engine of utmost mechanical strength.
Thus tortured and squeezed, at last it appears
Like a loose heap of ribbon, a glittering show,
Like music it tinkles and rings in your ears,
And, warmed by the pressure, is all in a glow.
This process achieved, it is doomed to sustain
The thump-after-thump of a gold-beater's mallet,
And at last is of service in sickness or pain
To cover a pill for a delicate palate.
Alas for the poet! who dares undertake
To urge reformation of national ill—
His head and his heart are both likely to ache
With the double employment of mallet and mill.
If he wish to instruct, he must learn to delight,
Smooth, ductile, and even, his fancy must flow,
Must tinkle and glitter like gold to the sight,
And catch in its progress a sensible glow.
After all, he must beat it as thin and as fine
As the leaf that unfolds what an invalid swallows,
For truth is unwelcome, however divine,
And unless you adorn it a nausea follows.
ON HER BEAUTIFUL TRANSCRIPT OF HORACE'S ODE, AD LIBRUM
MARIA, Could Horace have guessed
What honour awaited his ode,
To his own little volume addressed,
The honour which you have bestowed,
Who have traced it in characters here
So elegant, even and neat,
He had laughed at the critical sneer,
Which he seems to have trembled to meet.
And sneer if you please he had said,
A nymph shall hereafter arise,
Who shall give me, when you are all dead,
The glory your malice denies..
Shall dignity give to my lay,
Although but a mere bagatelle;
And even a poet shall say,
Nothing ever was written so well.
On the late indecent liberties taken with the remains of the great MiltonAnno 1790.
"ME too, perchance, in future days,
The sculptured stone shall show
With Paphian myrtle or with bays
Parnassian on my brow.
"But I, or ere that season come,
Escaped from every care,
|