The beasts that roam over the plain, Society, friendship, and love, My sorrows I then might assuage Religion! what treasure untold But the sound of the church-going bell Ye winds that have made me your sport, Convey to this desolate shore Some cordial endearing report Of a land I shall visit no more. My friends do they now and then send Though a friend I am never to see. How fleet is the glance of the mind, Compar'd with the speed of its flight! The tempest itself lags behind, And the swift-wing'd arrows of light. When I think on my own native land, Soon hurries me back to despair. But the sea fowl is gone to her nest, There is mercy in ev'ry place, And mercy, encouraging thought! Gives even affliction a grace, And reconciles man to his lot. Cowper. INSCRIPTION FOR A COPPICE. HEEDLESS wanderer, come not here With clamourous voice, or footstep rude, For harmony's sweet sake forbear To violate this solitude. For ne'er the nightingale forsakes This haunt when hawthorn blossoms spring; Veil'd in the shade of tangled brakes, She calls her nestlings forth to sing. Hark! catch you not their warbling wild, The earliest primrose of the year And while the western gales allay See, sparkling with a trembling gleam, If tempted by the twilight shade, Beneath the smooth-leaf'd beech to lay, Soon will the charms that dress the glade, Bring sweet oblivion of your way. But, heedless wand'rer, come not here, Universal Magazine. EPIGRAM. So zealously why will my friend To take a wife incessant prcss me? I'm well aware what joys attend, If heaven in my choice should bless me. But can one be too circumspect? -A man should think on't all his life. M. de Maucroix. ODE TO FOLLY. FOLLY adieu! here ends thy reign, And all thy light fantastic train; From midnight scenes of fancied joy, Where laughter grins at every toy, Thy constant votary before Thy presence flies-to come no more. No more shall Ceres' cup prevail, How pleas'd, amid the noisy crew, How strange it is! the froward mind |