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May they not pity us, condemn'd to bear
The various heaven of an obliquer sphere;
While by fix'd laws, and with a just return, [burn;
They feel twelve hours that shade, for twelve that
And praise the neighbouring Sun, whose constant
flame

Enlightens them with seasons still the same?
And may not those, whose distant lot is cast
North beyond Tartary's extended waste;
Where through the plains of one continual day
Six shining months pursue their even way,
And six succeeding urge their dusky flight,
Obscur'd with vapours, and o'erwhelm'd in night?
May not, I ask, the natives of these climes
(As annals may inform succeeding times)
To our quotidian change of heaven prefer
Their own vicissitude, and equal share
Of day and night, disparted through the year?
May they not scorn our Sun's repeated race,
To narrow bounds prescrib'd, and little space,
Hastening from morn, and headlong driven from

noon,

Half of our daily toil yet scarcely done?
May they not justly to our climes upbraid
Shortness of night, and penury of shade;
That, ere our wearied limbs are justly blest
With wholesome sleep, and necessary rest,
Another Sun demands return of care,
The remnant toil of yesterday to bear?
Whilst, when the solar beams salute their sight,
Bold and secure in half a year of light,
Uninterrupted voyages they take

To the remotest wood, and farthest lake;
Manage the fishing, and pursue the course [force?
With more extended nerves, and more continued
And, when declining day forsakes their sky,
When gathering clouds speak gloomy winter nigh;
With plenty for the coming season blest,
Six solid months (an age) they live, releas'd
From all the labour, process, clamour, woe,
Which our sad scenes of daily action know :
They light the shining lamp, prepare the feast,
And with full mirth receive the welcome guest;
Or tell their tender loves (the only care
Which now they suffer) to the listening fair;
And, rais'd in pleasure, or repos'd in ease,
(Grateful alternate of substantial peace)
They bless the long nocturnal influence shed
On the crown'd goblet, and the genial bed.
"In foreign isles, which our discoverers find,
Far from this length of continent disjoin'd,
The rugged bear's, or spotted lynx's brood,
Frighten the vallies, and infest the wood;
The hungry crocodile, and hissing snake,
Lurk in the troubled stream and fenny brake;
And man, untaught and ravenous as the beast,
Does valley, wood, and brake, and stream, infest:
Deriv'd these men and animals their birth
From trunk of oak, or pregnant womb of Earth?
Whence then the old belief, that all began
In Eden's shade, and one created man ?
Or, grant this progeny was wafted o'er,
By coasting boats, from next adjacent shore;
Would those, from whom we will suppose they
spring,

Slaughter to harmless lands and poison bring?
Would they on board or bears or lynxes take,
Feed the she-adder, and the brooding snake?
Or could they think the new-discover'd isle
Pleas'd to receive a pregnant crocodile ?

"And, since the savage lineage we must trace From Noah sav'd, and his distinguish'd race; How should their fathers happen to forget The arts which Noah taught, the rules he set, To sow the glebe, to plant the generous vine, And load with grateful flames the holy shrine; While the great sire's unhappy sons are found, Unpress'd their vintage, and untill'd their ground, Straggling o'er dale and hill in quest of food, And rude of arts, of virtue, and of God?

"How shall we next o'er earth and seas pursue
The varied forms of every thing we view ;
That all is chang'd, though all is still the same,
Fluid the parts, yet durable the frame?
Of those materials, which have been confess'd
The pristine springs and parents of the rest,
Each becomes other. Water stopp'd gives birth
To grass and plants, and thickens into earth:
Diffus'd, it rises in a higher sphere,
Dilates its drops, and softens into air:
Those finer parts of air again aspire,
Move into warmth, and brighten into fire:
The fire, once more by thicker air o'ercome,
And downward forc'd, in Earth's capacious womb
Alters its particles; is fire no more,

But lies resplendent dust, and shining ore;
Or, running through the mighty mother's veins,
Changes its shape, puts off its old remains;
With watery parts its lessen'd force divides,
Flows into waves, and rises into tides.

"Disparted streams shall from their channels fly,
And, deep surcharg'd, by sandy mountains lie,
Obscurely sepulcher'd. By beating rain,
And furious wind, down to the distant plain
The hill, that hides his head above the skies,
Shall fall; the plain, by slow degrees, shall rise
Higher than erst had stood the summit-hill;
For Time must Nature's great behest fulfil.

"Thus, by a length of years and change of fate, All things are light or heavy, small or great : Thus Jordan's waves shall future clouds appear, And Egypt's pyramids refine to air: Thus later age shall ask for Pison's flood, And travellers inquire where Babel stood. Now where we see these changes often fall, Sedate we pass them by as natural; Where to our eye more rarely they appear, The pompous name of prodigy they bear. Let active thought these close meanders trace; Let human wit their dubious boundaries place : Are all things miracle, or nothing such? And prove we not too little, or too much?

"For, that a branch cut off, a wither'd rod, Should, at a word pronounc'd, revive and bud; Is this more strange, than that the mountain's brow Stripp'd by December's frost, and white with snow, Should push in spring ten thousand thousand buds, And boast returning leaves, and blooming woods? That each successive night, from opening Heaven, The food of angels should to man be given; Is this more strange, than that with common bread Our fainting bodies every day are fed? Than that each grain and seed, consum'd in earth, Raises its store, and multiplies its birth, And from the handful, which the tiller sows, The labour'd fields rejoice, and future harvest flows.

"Then, from whate'er we can to sense produce, Common and plain, or wondrous and abstruse,

S 3

From Nature's constant or eccentric laws,

The thoughtful soul this general inference draws,
That an effect must pre-suppose a cause:
And, while she does her upward flight sustain,
Touching each link of the continued chain,
At length she is oblig'd and forc'd to see
A First, a Source, a Life, a Deity;
What has for ever been, and must for ever be.
"This great Existence, thus by reason found,
Blest by all power, with all perfection crown'd;
How can we bind or limit his decree,

By what our ear has heard, or eye may see?
Say then, is all in heaps of water lost,
Beyond the islands, and the mid-land coast?
Or has that God, who gave our world its birth,
Sever'd those waters by some other earth,
Countries by future plough-shares to be torn,
And cities raised by nations yet unborn!
Ere the progressive course of restless age
Performs three thousand times its annual stage,
May not our power and learning be supprest,
And arts and empire learn to travel west?

"Where, by the strength of this idea charm'd,
Lighten'd with glory, and with rapture warm'd,
Ascends my soul? what sees she white and great
Amidst subjected seas? An isle, the seat
Of power and plenty; her imperial throne,
For justice and for mercy sought and known;
Virtues sublime, great attributes of Heaven,
From thence to this distinguish'd nation given.
Yet farther west the western Isle extends
Her happy fame; her armed fleet she sends
To climates folded yet from human eye,
And lands, which we imagine wave and sky.
From pole to pole she hears her acts resound,
And rules an empire by no ocean bound;
Knows her ships anchor'd, and her sails unfurl'd,
In other Indies, and a second world.

"Long shall Britannia (that must be her name) Be first in conquest, and preside in fame: Long shall her favour'd monarchy engage The teeth of Envy, and the force of Age: Rever'd and happy she shall long remain, Of human things least changeable, least vain. Yet all must with the general doom comply, And this great glorious power, tho' last, must die. "Now let us leave this Earth, and lift our eye To the large convex of yon azure sky: Behold it like an ample curtain spread, Now streak'd and glowing with the morning red; Anon at noon in flaming yellow bright, And choosing sable for the peaceful night. Ask Reason now, whence light and shade were given, And whence this great variety of Heaven. Reason, our guide, what can she more reply, Than that the Sun illuminates the sky; Than that night rises from his absent ray, And his returning lustre kindles day?

"But we expect the morning-red in vain : 'Tis hid in vapours, or obscur'd by rain. The noon-tide yellow we in vain require : 'Tis black in storm, or red in lightning fire. Pitchy and dark the night sometimes appears, Friend to our woe, and parent of our fears: Our joy and wonder sometimes she excites, With stars unnumber'd, and eternal lights. Send forth, ye wise, send forth your labouring thought;

Let it return with empty notions fraught,

Of airy columns every moment broke,
Of circling whirlpools, and of spheres of smoke:
Yet this solution but once more affords
New change of terms, and scaffolding of words:
In other garb my question I receive,
And take the doubt the very same I gave.

"Lo! as a giant strong, the lusty Sun
Multiply'd rounds in one great round does run;
Twofold his course, yet constant his career,
Changing the day, and finishing the year.
Again, when his descending orb retires,
And Earth perceives the absence of his fires ;
The Moon affords us her alternate ray,
And with kind beams distributes fainter day,
Yet keeps the stages of her monthly race;
Various her beams, and changeable her face.
Each planet, shining in his proper sphere,
Does with just speed his radiant voyage steer;
Each sees his lamp with different lustre crown'd;
Each knows his course with different periods bound;
And, in his passage through the liquid space,
Nor hastens, nor retards, his neighbour's race.
Now, shine these planets with substantial rays?
Does innate lustre gild their measur'd days?
Or do they (as your schemes, I think, have shown)
Dart furtive beams and glory not their own,
All servants to that source of light, the Sun?

"Again I see ten thousand thousand stars, Nor cast in lines, in circles, nor in squares, (Poor rules, with which our bounded mind is fill'd, When we would plant, or cultivate, or build,) But shining with such vast, such various light, As speaks the hand, that form'd them, infinite. How mean the order and perfection sought, In the best product of the human thought, Compar'd to the great harmony that reigns In what the Spirit of the world ordains!

"Now if the Sun to Earth transmits his ray, Yet does not scorch us with too fierce a day! How small a portion of his power is given To orbs more distant, and remoter Heaven? And of those stars, which our imperfect eye Has doom'd and fix'd to one eternal sky, Each, by a native stock of honour great, May dart strong influence, and diffuse kind heat, (Itself a sun) and with transmissive light Enliven worlds deny'd to human sight. Around the circles of their ambient skies New moons may grow or wane, may set or rise, And other stars may to those suns be earths, Give their own elements their proper births, Divide their climes, or elevate their pole, See their lands flourish, and their oceans roll: Yet these great orbs, thus radically bright, Primitive founts, and origins of light, May each to other (as their different sphere Makes or their distance or their light appear) Be seen a nobler or inferior star,

And, in that space which we call air and sky, Myriads of earths, and moons, and suns, may lie, Unmeasur'd and unknown by human eye.

"In vain we measure this amazing sphere, And find and fix its centre here or there; Whilst its circumference, scorning to be brought Ev'n into fancy'd space, illudes our vanquish'd thought.

"Where then are all the radiant monsters driven, With which your guesses fill'd the frighten'd

Heaven?

Where will their fictious images remain?
In paper-schemes, and the Chaldean's brain.
"This problem yet, this offspring of a guess,
Let us for once a child of truth confess,
That these fair stars, these objects of delight
And terrour to our searching dazzled sight,
Are worlds immense, unnumber'd, infinite.
But do these worlds display their beams, or guide
Their orbs, to serve thy use, to please thy pride?
Thyself but dust, thy stature but a span,
A moment thy duration, foolish man!
As well may the minutest emmet say,
That Caucasus was rais'd to pave his way;
The snail, that Lebanon's extended wood
Was destin'd only for his walk and food;
The vilest cockle, gaping on the coast
That rounds the ample seas, as well may boast,
The craggy rock projects above the sky,
That he in safety at its foot may lie;
And the whole ocean's confluent waters swell, [shell.
Only to quench his thirst, or move and blanch his
"A higher flight the venturous goddess tries,
Leaving material worlds and local skies;
Inquires what are the beings, where the space,
That form'd and held the angels' ancient race.
For rebel Lucifer with Michael fought,
(I offer only what tradition taught,)
Embattled cherub against cherub rose,
Did shield to shield, and power to power oppose;
Heaven rung with triumph, Hell was fill'd with

woes.

What were these forms of which your volumes tell,
How some fought great, and others recreant fell?
These bound to bear an everlasting load,
Durance of chain, and banishment of God;
By fatal turns their wretched strength to tire,
To swim in sulphurous lakes, or land on solid fire:
While those, exalted to primeval light,
Excess of blessing, and supreme delight,
Only perceive some little pause of joys

In those great moments when their God employs
Their ministry, to pour his threaten'd hate
On the proud king, or the rebellious state;
Or to reverse Jehovah's high command,
And speak the thunder falling from his hand,
When to his duty the proud king returns,
And the rebellious state in ashes mourns ;
How can good angels be in Heaven confin'd,
Or view that presence, which no space can bind?
Is God above, beneath, or yon, or here?
He who made all, is he not every where?
Oh, how can wicked angels find a night
So dark, to hide them from that piercing light,
Which form'd the eye, and gave the power of sight?
"What mean I now of angel, when I hear
Firm body, spirit pure, or fluid air?
Spirits to action spiritual confin'd,

Friends to our thought, and kindred to our mind,
Should only act and prompt us from within,
Nor by external eye be ever seen.

Was it not, therefore, to our fathers known,
That these had appetite, and limb, and bone?
Else how could Abraham wash their weary'd feet?
Or Sarah please their taste with savoury meat?
Whence should they fear? or why did Lot engage
To save their bodies from abusive rage?
And how could Jacob, in a real fight,
Feel or resist the wrestling angel's might?
How could a form in strength with matter try?
Or how a spirit touch a mortal's thigh?

"Now are they air condens'd, or gather'd rays?
How guide they then our prayer, or keep our ways,
By stronger blasts still subject to be tost,
By tempests scatter'd, and in whirlwinds lost?
"Have they again (as sacred song proclaims)
Substances real, and existing frames?
How comes it, since with them we jointly share
The great effect of one Creator's care,
That, whilst our bodies sicken and decay,
Theirs are for ever healthy, young, and gay?
Why, whilst we struggle in this vale beneath
With want and sorrow, with disease and death,
Do they, more bless'd, perpetual life employ
On songs of pleasure, and in scenes of joy?

"Now when my mind has all this world survey'd,
And found, that nothing by itself was made;
When thought has rais'd itself, by just degrees,
From vallies crown'd with flowers, and hills with
trees;

From smoaking mineral, and from rising streams;
From fattening Nilus, or victorious Thames;
From all the living, that four-footed move
Along the shore, the meadow, or the grove;
From all that can with fins or feathers fly
Through the aërial or the watery sky;
From the poor reptile with a reasoning soul,
That miserable master of the whole;
From this great object of the body's eye,
This fair half-round, this ample azure sky,
Terribly large, and wonderfully bright,
With stars unnumber'd, and unmeasur'd light;
From essences unseen, celestial names,
Enlightening spirits, and ministerial flames,
Angels, dominions, potentates, and thrones,
All that in each degree the name of creature owns:
Lift we our reason to that sovereign Cause, [laws;
Who blest the whole with life, and bounded it with
Who forth from nothing call'd this comely frame,
His will and act, his word and work the same;
To whom a thousand years are but a day;
Who bade the Light her genial beams display,
And set the Moon, and taught the Sun its way;
Who, waking Time, his creature, from the source
Primeval, order'd his predestin'd course;
Himself, as in the hollow of his hand,
Holding, obedient to his high command,
The deep abyss, the long-continued store,
Where months, and days, and hours, and minutes
Their floating parts, and thenceforth are no more:
This Alpha and Omega, first and last,
Who like the potter in a mould has cast
The world's great framne, commanding it to be
Such as the eyes of Sense and Reason see;
| Yet if he wills may change or spoil the whole;
May take yon' beauteous, mystic, starry roll,
And burn it like an useless parchment scroll;
May from its basis in one moment pour
This melted earth

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Like liquid metal, and like burning ore;

Who, sole in power, at the beginning said,

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Let Sea, and Air, and Earth, and Heaven be made;

And it was so and, when he shall ordain

In other sort, has but to speak again,

And they shall be no more: of this great theme,
This glorious, hallow'd, everlasting name,
This Gon, I would discourse.".

The learned elders sat appall'd, amaz'd,
And each with mutual look on other gaz'd;
Nor speech they meditate, nor answer frame,
(Too plain, alas! their silence spake their shame)

Till one, in whom an outward mien appear'd,
And turn superior to the vulgar herd,
Began: That human learning's furthest reach
Was but to note the doctrine I could teach;
That mine to speak, and theirs was to obey;
For I in knowledge more than power did sway:
And the astonish'd world in me beheld
Moses eclips'd, and Jesse's son excell'd.
Humble a second bow'd, and took the word;
Foresaw my name by future age ador'd:
"O live," said he, "thou wisest of the wise;
As none has equall'd, none shall ever rise
Excelling thee."

Parent of wicked, bane of honest deeds,
Pernicious Flattery! thy malignant seeds,
In an ill hour, and by a fatal hand,
Sadly diffus'd o'er Virtue's gleby land,
With rising pride amidst the corn appear,
And choke the hopes and harvest of the year.

And now the whole perplex'd ignoble crowd,
Mute to my questions, in my praises loud,
Echo'd the word: whence things arose, or how
They thus exist, the aptest nothing know:
What yet is not, but is ordain'd to be,
All veil of doubt apart, the dullest see!

My prophets and my sophists finish'd here
The civil efforts of the verbal war :
Not so my rabbins and logicians yield;
Retiring, still they combat; from the field
Of open arms unwilling they depart,
And skulk behind the subterfuge of art.
To speak one thing, mix'd dialects they join,
Divide the simple, and the plain define;
Fix fancy'd laws, and form imagin'd rules,
Terms of their art, and jargon of their schools,
Ill-grounded maxims, by false gloss enlarg'd,
And captious science against reason charg'd.

Soon their crude notions with each other fought;
The adverse sect deny'd what this had taught;
And he at length the amplest triumph gain'd,
Who contradicted what the last maintain'd.

O wretched impotence of human mind!
We, erring still, excuse for errour find,
And darkling grope, not knowing we are blind.
Vain man! since first thy blushing sire essay'd
His folly with connected leaves to shade,
How does the crime of thy resembling race
With like attempt that pristine errour trace!
Too plain thy nakedness of soul espy'd,
Why dost thou strive the conscious shame to hide
By masks of eloquence and veils of pride?

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"I gat me men-singers and women-singers, and the delights of the sons of men, as musical instruments, and that of all sorts."- Ver. 8.

"I sought in mine heart to give myself unto wine, (yet acquainting mine heart with wisdom) and to lay hold on folly, till I might see what was that good for the sons of men, which they should do under Heaven all the days of their life."Ver. 3.

"Then I said in my heart, As it happeneth unto

the fool, so it happeneth even unto me; and why was I then more wise? Then I said in my heart, that this also is vanity."- Ver. 15.

"Therefore I hated life, because the work that is wrought under the Sun is grievous unto me.”. Ver. 17.

With outward smiles their flattery I receiv'd,
Own'd my sick mind by their discourse reliev'd;
But bent, and inward to myself, again
Perplex'd, these matters I revolv'd in vain.
My search still tir'd, my labour still renew'd,
At length I ignorance and knowledge view'd,
Impartial; both in equal balance laid, [weigh'd."
Light flew the knowing scale, the doubtful heavy
Fore'd by reflective reason, I confess,
That human science is uncertain guess.
Alas! we grasp at clouds, and beat the air,
Vexing that spirit we intend to clear.
Can thought beyond the bounds of matter climb ?
Or who shall tell me what is space or time?
In vain we lift up our presumptuous eyes
To what our Maker to their ken denies :
The searcher follows fast; the object faster flies.
The little which imperfectly we find,
Seduces only the bewilder'd mind

To fruitless search of something yet behind.

Dead flies cause the ointment to send forth a stinking savour: so doth a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honour."- Ch. x.

ver. 1.

"The memory of the just is blessed, but the memory of the wicked shall rot."— PROVERES, CA. 1. ver. 7.

The Argument.

Solomon, again seeking happiness, inquires if wealth and greatness can produce it; begins with the magnificence of gardens and buildings, the luxury of music and feasting; and proceeds to the hopes

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and desires of love. In two episodes are shown | the follies and troubles of that passion. Solomon, still disappointed, falls under the temptations of libertinism and idolatry; recovers his thought; reasons aright; and concludes, that, as to the pursuit of pleasure and sensual delight, All is vanity and vexation of spirit.

TRY then, O man, the moments to deceive,
That from the womb attend thee to the grave:
For weary'd Nature find some apter scheme :
Health be thy hope, and Pleasure be thy theme.
From the perplexing and unequal ways,
Where study brings thee; from the endless maze,
Which doubt persuades to run, forewarn'd, recede
To the gay field and flowery path, that lead
To jocund mirth, soft joy, and careless ease:
Forsake what may instruct, for what may please;
Essay amusing art, and proud expense,
And make thy reason subject to thy sense.

I commun'd thus: the power of wealth I try'd,
And all the various luxe of costly pride;
Artists and plans reliev'd my solemn hours;
I founded palaces, and planted bowers;
Birds, fishes, beasts, of each exotic kind,
I to the limits of my court confin'd;
To trees transferr'd I gave a second birth,
And bade a foreign shade grace Judah's earth;
Fish-ponds were made, where former forests grew,
And hills were levell'd to extend the view;
Rivers diverted from their native course,
And bound with chains of artificial force,
From large cascades in pleasing tumult roll'd,
Or rose through figur'd stone, or breathing gold;
From furthest Africa's tormented womb
The marble brought, erects the spacious dome,
Or forms the pillars long-extended rows,

On which the planted grove, the pensile garden, grows.

The workmen here obey the master's call,
To gild the turret, and to paint the wall,
To mark the pavement there with various stone,
And on the jasper steps to rear the throne :
The spreading cedar, that an age had stood,
Supreme of trees, and mistress of the wood,
Cut down and carv'd, my shining roof adorns,
And Lebanon his ruin'd honour mourns.

A thousand artists show their cunning power,
To raise the wonders of the ivory tower.
A thousand maidens ply the purple loom,
To weave the bed, and deck the regal room;
Till Tyre confesses her exhausted store,
That on her coast the murex * is no more;
Till from the Parian isle, and Libya's coast,
The mountains grieve their hopes of marble lost;
And India's woods return their just complaint,
Their brood decay'd, and want of elephant.

My full design with vast expense achiev'd,
I came, beheld, admir'd, reflected, griev'd;
I chid the folly of my thoughtless haste,
For, the work perfected, the joy was past.

To my new courts sad Thought did still repair,
And round my gilded roofs hung hovering Care.
In vain on silken beds I sought repose,
And restless oft from purple couches rose;
Vexatious Thought still found my flying mind
Nor bound by limits, nor to place confin'd;

The murex is a shell-fish, of the liquor whereof a purple colour is made.

Haunted my nights, and terrify'd my days;
Stalk'd through my gardens, and pursued my ways,
Nor shut from artful bower, nor lost in winding

maze.

Yet take thy bent, my soul; another sense
Indulge; add music to magnificence:
Essay if harmony may grief control,
Or power of sound prevail upon the soul.
Often our seers and poets have confest,
That music's force can tame the furious beast.
Can make the wolf, or foaming boar, restrain
His rage; the lion drop his crested mane,
Attentive to the song; the lynx forget
His wrath to man, and lick the minstrel's feet.
Are we, alas! less savage yet than these?
Else music, sure, may human cares appease.

I spake my purpose; and the cheerful choir
Parted their shares of harmony: the lyre
Soften'd the timbrel's noise; the trumpet's sound
Provok'd the Dorian flute (both sweeter found
When mix'd); the fife the viol's notes refin'd,
And every strength with every grace was join'd.
Each morn they wak'd me with a sprightly lay;
Of opening Heaven they sung and gladsome day.
Each evening their repeated skill express'd
Scenes of repose, and images of rest:
Yet still in vain; for music gather'd thought:
But how unequal the effects it brought!
The soft ideas of the cheerful note,
Lightly receiv'd, were easily forgot;
The solemn violence of the graver sound
Knew to strike deep, and leave a lasting wound.
And now reflecting, I with grief descry

The sickly lust of the fantastic eye;
How the weak organ is with seeing cloy'd,
Flying ere night what it at noon enjoy'd.
And now (unhappy search of thought!) I found
The fickle ear soon glutted with the sound,
Condemn'd eternal changes to pursue,
Tir'd with the last, and eager of the new.

I bade the virgins and the youth advance,
To temper music with the sprightly dance.
In vain! too low the mimic motions seem;
What takes our heart must merit our esteem.
Nature, I thought, perform'd too mean a part,
Forming her movements to the rules of art;
And, vex'd, I found that the musician's hand
Had o'er the dancer's mind too great command.
I drank; I lik'd it not; 'twas rage, 'twas noise,
An airy scene of transitory joys.

In vain I trusted that the flowing bowl
Would banish sorrow, and enlarge the soul.
To the late revel, and protracted feast,
Wild dreams succeeded, and disorder'd rest;
And as, at dawn of morn, fair Reason's light
Broke through the fumes and phantoms of the night,
What had been said, I ask'd my soul, what done?
How flow'd our mirth, and whence the source begun?
Perhaps the jest that charm'd the sprightly crowd,
And made the jovial table laugh so loud,
To some false notion ow'd its poor pretence,
To an ambiguous word's perverted sense,
To a wild sonnet, or a wanton air,
Offence and torture to the sober ear:
Perhaps, alas! the pleasing stream was brought
From this man's errour, from another's fault;
From topics, which good-nature would forget,
And prudence mention with the last regret.

Add yet unnumber'd ills, that lie unseen
In the pernicious draught; the word obscene,

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