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النشر الإلكتروني

Cherish honour, virtue, truth,

So shalt thou prolong thy youth.

Wanting these, however fast

Man be fixt, and form'd to last,

He is lifeless even now,

Stone at heart, and cannot grow.

ANOTHER,

For a Stone erected on a similar occasion at the same place in the following year.

[JUNE 1790.]

READER! Behold a monument

That asks no sigh or tear,

Though it perpetuate the event

Of a great burial here.

Anno 1791.

HYMN

FOR THE USE OF THE

SUNDAY SCHOOL AT OLNEY.

[JULY 1790.]

HEAR, Lord, the song of praise and pray'r, In heaven thy dwelling-place,

From infants made the public care,

And taught to seek thy face!

Thanks for thy Word and for thy Day;
And grant us, we implore,

Never to waste in sinful play
Thy holy Sabbaths more.

Thanks that we hear-but oh! impart

To each desires sincere,

That we may listen with our heart,

And learn as well as hear.

For if vain thoughts the minds engage

Of elder far than we,

What hope that at our heedless age

Our minds should e'er be free?

Much hope, if thou our spirits take
Under thy gracious sway,

Who canst the wisest wiser make,
And Babes as wise as they.

Wisdom and bliss thy word bestows,

A sun that ne'er declines

And be thy mercies show'r'd on those
Who placed us where it shines.*

*Note by the Editor.-This Hymn was written at the request of the Rev. James Bean, then Vicar of Olney, to be sung by the children of the Sunday Schools of that town, after a Charity Sermon, preached at the parish church for their benefit, on Sunday, July 31, 1790.

STANZAS

On the late indecent Liberties taken with the Remains of the great Milton,—Anno 1790.

[AUGUST 1790.]

"ME too, perchance, in future days,
"The sculptur'd stone shall show,
“With Paphian myrtle or with bays
"Parnassian on my brow.

"But I, or ere that season come,

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"Shall reach my refuge in the tomb,
"And sleep securely there.” *

* Forsitan et nostros ducat de marmore vultus
Nectens aut Paphia myrti aut Pernasside lauri
Fronde comas-At ego secura pace quiescam.

MILTON IN MANSO.

So sang, in Roman tone and style,

The youthful bard, ere long

Ordain'd to grace his native isle
With her sublimest song.

Who then but must conceive disdain,

Hearing the deed unblest

Of wretches who have dar'd prophane His dread sepulchral rest?

Ill fare the hands that heav'd the stones

Where Milton's ashes lay,

That trembled not to grasp his bones

And steal his dust away!

O ill-requited bard! neglect
Thy living worth repaid,

And blind idolatrous respect

As much affronts thee dead.

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