The sacred shades, that slowly rising pass
Before my wondering eyes. First Socrates,
Who, firmly good in a corrupted state,
Against the rage of tyrants single stood,
Invincible! calm reason's holy law,
That voice of God within th' attentive mind,
Obeying, fearless, or in life, or death:
Great moral teacher! wisest of mankind !
Solon the next, who built his common-weal
On equity's wide base; by tender laws
A lively people curbing, yet undamp'd,
Preserving still that quick peculiar fire,
Whence in the laurell'd field of finer arts,
And of bold freedom, they unequall'd shone,
The pride of smiling Greece, and human-kind.
ycurgus then, who bow'd beneath the force
Of strictest discipline, severely wise,

ll human passions. Following him I see,
s at Thermopylæ he glorious fell,
he firm devoted chief who prov'd by deeds
he hardest lesson which the other taught.
hen Aristides lifts his honest front;
potless of heart, to whom th' unflattering voice
f freedom gave the noblest name of just;
1 pure majestic poverty rever'd;
ho, ev'n his glory to his country's weal
bmitting, swell'd a haughty rival's + fame.
ear'd by his care, of softer ray appears
mon, sweet-soul'd; whose genius, rising strong,
ook off the load of young debauch; abroad
le scourge of Persian pride, at home the friend
every worth and every splendid art;
odest and simple in the pomp of wealth.
en the last worthies of declining Greece,
ite call'd to glory, in unequal times,

nsive, appear.

The fair Corinthian boast,
moleon, happy temper! mild and firm,
ho wept the brother while the tyrant bled.
id, equal to the best, the Theban pair ‡,
hose virtues, in heroic concord join'd,

eir country rais'd to freedom, empire, fame.
too, with whom Athenian honour sunk,
d left a mass of sordid lees behind:
ocion the good; in public life severe,
virtue still inexorably firm;

t when, beneath his low illustrious roof,

eet peace and happy wisdom smooth'd his brow,

t friendship softer was, nor love more kind.
d he, the last of old Lycurgus' sons,
e generous victim to that vain attempt,
save a rotten state, Agis, who saw

'n Sparta's self to servile avarice sunk.
e two Achaïan heroes close the train:
atus, who awhile relum'd the soul
fondly lingering liberty in Greece:
d he her darling, as her latest hope,
e gallant Philopomen; who to arms
rn'd the luxurious pomp he could not cure;
toiling in his farm a simple swain ;
bold and skilful, thundering in the field.
Of rougher front, a mighty people come !
race of heroes! in those virtuous times,

ich knew no stain, save that with partial flame
eir dearest country they too fondly lov'd:
r better founder first, the light of Rome,
ma, who soften'd her rapacious sons :

• Leonidas.

+ Themistocles.

Pelopidas and Epaminondas.

Servius the king, who laid the solid base
On which o'er Earth the vast republic spread.
Then the great consuls venerable rise.
The public father §, who the private quell'd,
As on the dread tribunal sternly sad.
He, whom his thankless country could not loss,
Camillus, only vengeful to his foes.
Fabricius, scorner of all-conquering gold;
And Cincinnatus, aweful from the plough.
Thy willing victim ||, Carthage, bursting loose
From all that pleading Nature could oppose,
From a whole city's tears, by rigid faith
Imperious call'd, and honour's dire command.
Scipio, the gentle chief, humanely brave,
Who soon the race of spotless glory ran,
And warm in youth, to the poetic shade
With Friendship and Philosophy retir❜d.
Tully, whose powerful eloquence awhile
Restrain'd the rapid fate of rushing Rome.
Unconquer'd Cato, virtuous in extreme.
And thou, unhappy Brutus, kind of heart,
Whose steady arm, by aweful virtue urg'd,
Lifted the Roman steel against thy friend.
Thousands besides the tribute of a verse
Demand; but who can count the stars of Heaven?
Who sing their influence on this lower world?

Behold, who yonder comes! in sober state,
Fair, mild, and strong, as is a vernal sun :
'Tis Phoebus' self, or else the Mantuan Swain!
Great Homer too appears, of daring wing,
Parent of song! and equal by his side,
The British Muse; join'd hand in hand they walk,
Darkling, full up the middle steep to Fame.
Nor absent are those shades, whose skilful touch
Pathetic drew th' impassion'd heart, and charm'd
Transported Athens with the moral scene:
Nor those who, tuneful, wak'd th' enchanting lyre.
First of your kind! society divine;
Still visit thus my nights, for you reserv'd,
And mount my soaring soul to thoughts like yours.
Silence, thou lonely power! the door be thine:
See on the hallow'd hour that none intrude,
Save a few chosen friends, who sometimes deign
To bless my humble roof, with sense refin'd,
Learning digested well, exalted faith,
Unstudy'd wit, and humour ever gay.
Or from the Muses' hill will Pope descend,
To raise the sacred hour, to bid it smile,
And with the social spirit warm the heart?
For though not sweeter his own Homer sings,
Yet is his life the more endearing song.

Where art thou, Hammond? thou the darling pride,

The friend and lover of the tuneful throng!
Ah, why, dear youth, in all the blooming prime
Of vernal genius, where disclosing fast
Each active worth, each manly virtue lay,
Why wert thou ravish'd from our hope so soon?
What now avails that noble thirst of fame,
Which stung thy fervent breast? that treasur'd store
Of knowledge early gain'd? that eager zeal
To serve thy country, glowing in the band
Of youthful patriots, who sustain her name?
What now, alas! that life-diffusing charm
Of sprightly wit? that rapture for the Muse,
That heart of friendship, and that soul of joy,
Which bade with softest light thy virtues smile?

$ Marcus Junius Brutus. Regulus.

Ah! only show'd, to check our fond pursuits,
And teach our humbled hopes that life is vain!
Thus in some deep retirement would I pass
The Winter-glooms, with friends of pliant soul,
Or blithe, or solemn, as the theme inspir'd: [frame
With them would search, if Nature's boundless
Was call'd, late-rising from the void of night,
Or sprung eternal from th' Eternal Mind;
Its life, its laws, its progress, and its end.
Hence larger prospects of the beauteous whole
Would, gradual, open on our opening minds;
And each diffusive harmony unite

In full perfection to th' astonish'd eye.
Then would we try to scan the moral world,
Which, though to us it seems embroil'd, moves on
In higher order; fitted, and impell'd,
By Wisdom's finest hand, and issuing all
In general good. The sage historic Muse
Should next conduct us through the deeps of time:
Show us how empire grew, declin'd, and fell,
In scatter'd states; what makes the nations smile,
Improves their soil, and gives them double suns;
And why they pine beneath the brightest skies,
In Nature's richest lap. As thus we talk'd,
Our hearts would burn within us, would inhale
The portion of divinity, that ray

Of purest Heaven, which lights the public soul
Of patriots, and of heroes. But if doom'd,
In powerless humble fortune, to repress
These ardent risings of the kindling soul;
Then, ev'n superior to ambition, we
Would learn the private virtues how to glide
Through shades and plains, along the smoothest

stream

Of rural life or snatch'd away by hope,
Through the dim spaces of futurity,
With earnest eye anticipate those scenes
Of happiness, and wonder; where the mind,
In endless growth and infinite ascent,
Rises from state to state, and world to world.
But when with these the serious thought is foil'd,
We, shifting for relief, would play the shapes
Of frolic Fancy; and incessant form
Those rapid pictures, that assembled train
Of fleet ideas, never join'd before,
Whence lively Wit excites to gay surprise;
Or folly-painting Humour, grave himself,
Calls Laughter forth, deep-shaking every nerve.
Meantime the village rouses up the fire;
While well attested, and as well believ'd,
Heard solemn, goes the goblin-story round;
Till superstitious horrour creeps o'er all.
Or, frequent in the sounding hall, they wake
The rural gambol. Rustic mirth goes round;
The simple joke that takes the shepherd's heart,
Easily pleas'd; the long loud laugh, sincere ;
The kiss, snatch'd hasty from the side-long maid,
On purpose guardless, or pretending sleep:
The leap, the slap, the haul; and, shook to notes
Of native music, the respondent dance.
Thus jocund fleets with them the winter-night.

The city swarms intense. The public haunt,
Full of each theme, and warm with mixt discourse,
Hums indistinct. The sons of riot flow
Down the loose stream of false enchanted joy,
To swift destruction. On the rankled soul
The gaming fury falls; and in one gulph
Of total ruin, honour, virtue, peace,
Friends, families, and fortune, headlong sink.
Up-springs the dance along the lighted dome,

Mix'd and evolv'd, a thousand sprightly ways.
The glittering court effuses every pomp;
The circle deepens: bearn'd from gaudy robes,
Tapers, and sparkling gems, and radiant eyes,
A soft effulgence o'er the palace waves:
While, a gay insect in his summer-shine,
The fop, light-fluttering, spreads his mealy wings
Dread o'er the scene, the ghost of Hamlet stalks;
Othello rages; poor Monimia mourns;
And Belvidera pours her soul in love.
Terrour alarms the breast; the comely tear
Steals o'er the cheek: or else the comic Muse
Holds to the world a picture of itself,
And raises sly the fair impartial laugh.
Sometimes she lifts her strain, and paints the scenes
Of beauteous life; whate'er can deck mankind,
Or charm the heart, in generous Bevil show'd

O, thou, whose wisdom, solid yet refin d,
Whose patriot-virtues, and consummate skill
To touch the finer springs that move the world,
Join'd to whate'er the Graces can bestow,
And all Apollo's animating fire,
Give thee, with pleasing dignity, to shine
At once the guardian, ornament, and joy,
Of polish'd life; permit the rural Muse,
O Chesterfield, to grace with thee her song!
Ere to the shades again she humbly flies,
Indulge her fond ambition, in thy train
(For every Muse has in thy train a place)
To mark thy various full-accomplish'd mind:
To mark that spirit, which, with British scorn,
Rejects th' allurements of corrupted power;
That elegant politeness, which excels,
Ev'n in the judgment of presumptuous France,
The boasted manners of her shining court;
That wit, the vivid energy of sense,
The truth of Nature, which, with Attic point,
And kind well-temper'd satire, smoothly keen,
Steals through the soul, and without pain corrects
Or, rising thence with yet a brighter flame,
O, let me hail thee on some glorious day,
When to the listening senate, ardent, crowd
Britannia's sons to hear her pleaded cause.
Then drest by thee, more amiably fair,
Truth the soft robe of mild persuasion wears:
Thou to assenting reason giv'st again
Her own enlighten'd thoughts; call'd from
Th' obedient passions on thy voice attend;
And ev'n reluctant party feels awhile
Thy gracious power: as through the varied mate
Of eloquence, now smooth, now quick, now strong
Profound and clear, you roll the copious flood.

To thy lov'd haunt return, my happy Muse: For now, behold, the joyous Winter-days, Frosty, succeed; and through the blue serene, For sight too fine, th' etherial nitre flies; Killing infectious damps, and the spent air Storing afresh with elemental life. Close crowds the shining atmosphere; and binds Our strengthen'd bodies in its cold embrace, Constringent; feeds, and animates our blood; Refines our spirits, through the new-strung nerve In swifter sallies darting to the brain; Where sits the soul, intense, collected, cool, Bright as the skies, and as the season keen. All Nature feels the renovating force Of Winter, only to the thoughtless eye

• A character in the Conscious Lovers, wri by Sir Richard Steele.

What art thou, frost? and whence are thy keen Deriv'd, thou secret all-invading power, Whom ev'n th' illusive fluid cannot fly?

Is not thy potent energy, unseen,

The loosen'd ice,

Myriads of little salts, or hook'd, or shap'd Like double wedges, and diffus'd immense Through water, earth, and ether? Hence at eve, Steam'd eager from the red horizon round, With the fierce rage of Winter deep suffus'd, An icy gale, oft shifting, o'er the pool Breathes a blue film, and in its mid career Arrests the bickering stream. Let down the flood, and half dissolv'd by day, Rustles no more; but to the sedgy bank Fast grows, or gathers round the pointed stone, A crystal pavement, by the breath of Heaven Cemented firm; till, seiz'd from shore to shore, The whole imprison'd river growls below. Loud rings the frozen earth, and hard reflects A double noise; while, at his evening watch, The village dog deters the nightly thief; The heifer lows; the distant water-fall Swells in the breeze; and, with the hasty tread Of traveller, the hollow-sounding plain Shakes from afar. The full ethereal round, Infinite worlds disclosing to the view, Shines out intensely keen; and, all one cope Of starry glitter, glows from pole to pole. From pole to pole the rigid influence falls, Through the still night, incessant, heavy, strong, And seizes Nature fast. It freezes on; Fill Morn, late-rising o'er the drooping world, ifts her pale eye unjoyous. Then appears The various labour of the silent Night: Prone from the dripping cave, and dumb cascade, Whose idle torrents only seem to roar, The pendant icicle; the frost-work fair, Where transient hues and fancy'd figures rise; Vide-spouted o'er the hill, the frozen brook, A livid tract, cold-gleaming on the morn; The forest bent beneath the plumy wave; And by the frost refin'd the whiter snow, ncrusted hard, and sounding to the tread Of early shepherd, as he pensive seeks lis pining flock, or from the mountain-top, 'leas'd with the slippery surface, swift descends. On blithsome frolicks bent, the youthful swains, While every work of man is laid at rest, 'ond o'er the river crowd, in various sport And revelry dissolv'd; where mixing glad, Happiest of all the train! the raptur'd boy ashes the whirling top. Or, where the Rhine Branch'd out in many a long canal extends, From every province swarming, void of care, atavia rushes forth; and as they sweep, n sounding skates, a thousand different ways, circling poise, swift as the winds, along, he then gay land is madden'd all to joy.

or less the northern courts, wide o'er the snow, our a new pomp. Eager, on rapid sleds, heir vigorous youth in bold contention wheel e long resounding course. Meantime, to raise

The manly strife, with highly blooming charms,
Flush'd by the season, Scandinavia's dames,
Or Russia's buxom daughters, glow around.

Pure, quick, and sportful, is the wholesome day;
But soon elaps'd. The horizontal Sun,
Broad o'er the south, hangs at his utmost noon :
And, ineffectual, strikes the gelid cliff:
His azure gloss the mountain still maintains,
Nor feels the feeble touch. Perhaps the vale
Relents awhile to the reflected ray;
Or from the forest falls the cluster'd snow,
Myriads of gems, that in the waving gleam
Gay-twinkle as they scatter. Thick around
Thunders the sport of those, who with the gun,
And dog impatient bounding at the shot,
Worse than the season, desolate the fields:
And, adding to the ruins of the year,
Distress the footed or the feather'd game.

But what is this? Our infant Winter sinks,
Divested of his grandeur, should our eye
Astonish'd shoot into the frigid zone;
Where, for relentless months, continual Night
Holds o'er the glittering waste her starry reign.

There, through the prison of unbounded wilds,
Barr'd by the hand of Nature from escape,
Wide roams the Russian exile. Nought around
Strikes his sad eye, but deserts lost in snow;
And heavy-loaded groves; and solid floods,
That stretch athwart the solitary vast,
Their icy horrours to the frozen main ;
And cheerless towns far distant, never bless'd,
Save when its annual course the caravan
Bends to the golden coast of rich Cathay",
With news of human-kind. Yet there life glows:
Yet cherish'd there, beneath the shining waste,
The furry nations harbour: tipt with jet,
Fair ermines, sportless as the snows they press;
Sables, of glossy black; and dark-embrown'd,
Or beauteous freakt with many a mingled hue,
Thousands besides, the costly pride of courts.
There, warm together press'd, the trooping deer
Sleep on the new-fall'n snows; and, scarce his head
Rais'd o'er the heapy wreath, the branching elk
Lies slumbering sullen in the white abyss.
The ruthless hunter wants nor dogs nor toils,
Nor with the dread of sounding bows he drives
The fearful flying race: with ponderous clubs,
As weak against the mountain-heaps they push
Their beating breast in vain, and piteous bray,
He lays them quivering on the ensanguin'd snows,
And with loud shouts rejoicing bears them home.
There, through the piny forest half-absorpt,
Rough tenant of these shades, the shapeless bear,
With dangling ice all horrid, stalks forlorn ;
Slow-plac'd, and sourer as the storms increase,
He makes his bed beneath th' inclement drift,
And, with stern patience, scorning weak complaint,
Hardens his heart against assailing want.

Wide o'er the spacious regions of the north, That sees Bootes urge his tardy wain, A boisterous race, by frosty Caurus † pierc'd, Who little pleasure know, and fear no pain, Prolific swarm. They once relum'd the flame Of lost mankind in polish'd slavery sunk, Drove martial horde on horde ‡, with dreadful sweep Resistless rushing o'er th' enfeebled south,

• The old name for China.

+ The north-west wind. The wandering Scythian clans.

And gave the vanquish'd world another form.
Not such the sons of Lapland: wisely they
Despise th' insensate barbarous trade of war;
They ask no more than simple Nature gives;
They love their mountains, and enjoy their storms.
No false desires, no pride-created wants,
Disturb the peaceful current of their time,
And through the restless ever-tortur'd maze
Of pleasure, or ambition, bid it rage.
Their rein-deer form their riches. These their tents,
Their robes, their beds, and all their homely wealth
Supply, their wholesome fare, and cheerful cups.
Obsequious at their call, the docile tribe
Yield to the sled their necks, and whirl them swift
O'er hill and dale, heap'd into one expanse
Of marbled snow, as far as eye can sweep,
With a blue crust of ice unbounded glaz'd.
By dancing meteors then, that ceaseless shake
A waving blaze refracted o'er the heavens,
And vivid moons, and stars that keener play
With double lustre from the glossy waste,
Ev'n in the depth of polar night, they find
A wondrous day: enough to light the chase,
Or guide their daring steps to Finland fairs.
Wish'd Spring returns; and from the hazy south,
While dim Aurora slowly moves before,
The welcome Sun, just verging up at first,
By small degrees extends the swelling curve!
Till seen at large for gay rejoicing months,
Still round and round his spiral course he winds,
And as he nearly dips his flaming orb,
Wheels up again, and re-ascends the sky.
In that glad season from the lakes and floods,
Where pure Niemi's fairy mountains rise,
And fring'd with roses Tenglio† rolls his stream,
They draw the copious fry.
With these, at eve,
They cheerful loaded to their tents repair;
Where, all day long in useful care employ'd,
Their kind unblemish'd wives the fire prepare.
Thrice happy race! by poverty secur'd
From legal plunder and rapacious power:
In whom fell interest never yet has sown

Here Winter holds his unrejoicing court;
And through his airy hall the loud misrule
Of driving tempest is for ever heard:
Here the grim tyrant meditates his wrath;
Here arms his winds with all-subduing frost;
Moulds his fierce hail, and treasures up his snows,
With which he now oppresses half the globe.

Thence winding eastward to the Tartar's coast,
She sweeps the howling margin of the main;
Where undissolving, from the first of time,
Snows swell on snows amazing to the sky;
And icy mountains, high on mountains pil'd,
Seem to the shivering sailor from afar,
Shapeless and white, an atmosphere of clouds.
Projected huge, and horrid, o'er the surge,
Alps frown on Alps, or rushing hideous down,
As if old Chaos was again return'd,
Wide-rend the deep, and shake the solid Pole.
Ocean itself no longer can resist

The binding fury; but, in all its rage
Of tempest, taken by the boundless frost,
Is many a fathom to the bottom chain'd,
And bid to roar no more: a bleak expanse,
Shagg'd o'er with wavy rocks, cheerless, and void
Of every life, that from the dreary months
Flies conscious southward. Miserable they,
Who, here entangled in the gathering ice,
Take their last look of the descending Sun;
While, full of death, and fierce with tenfold frost,
The long long night, incumbent o'er their heads,
Falls horrible. Such was the Briton's § fate,
As with first prow (what have not Britons dar'd!)
He for the passage sought, attempted since
So much in vain, and seeming to be shut
By jealous Nature with eternal bars.
In these fell regions, in Arzina caught,
And to the stony deep his idle ship
Immediate seal'd, he with his hapless crew,
Each full-exerted at his several task,
Froze into statues; to the cordage glued
The sailor, and the pilot to the helm.

[stream

Injurious deed, nor, blasted by the breath

Of faithless love, their blooming daughters woe.
Still pressing on, beyond Tornea's lake,
And Hecla flaming through a waste of snow,
And farthest Greenland, to the Pole itself,
Where, failing gradual, life at length goes out,
The Muse expands her solitary flight;
And, hovering o'er the wild stupendous scene,
Beholds new seas beneath another sky.
Thron'd in his palace of cerulean ice,

M. de Maupertuis, in his book on the Figure of the Earth, after having described the beautiful lake and mountain of Niemi in Lapland, says, "From this height we had opportunity several times to see those vapours rise from the lake, which the people of the country call Haltios, and which they deem to be the guardian spirits of the mountains. We had been frighted with stories of bears that haunted this place, but saw none. It seemed rather a place of resort for Fairies and Genii, than bears."

The same author observes; -"I was surprised to see upon the banks of this river (the Tenglio) roses of as lively a red as any that are in our gardens."

The other hemisphere.

And half-enliven'd by the distant Sun,
That rears and ripens man, as well as plants,
Here human nature wears its rudest form.
Deep from the piercing season sunk in caves,
Here by dull fires, and with unjoyous cheer,
They waste the tedious gloom. Immers'd in furs.
Doze the gross race. Nor sprightly jest, nor song,
Nor tenderness they know; nor aught of life,
Beyond the kindred bears that stalk without.
Till Morn at length, her roses drooping all,
Sheds a long twilight brightening o'er their fields,
And calls the quiver'd savage to the chase.

What cannot active government perform, New-moulding man? Wide-stretching from these shores,

A people savage from remotest time,
A huge neglected empire, one vast mind,
By Heaven inspir'd, from Gothic darkness call'd
Immortal Peter! first of monarchs! He
His stubborn country tam'd, her rocks, her fens,
Her floods, her seas, her ill-submitting sons;
And while the fierce barbarian he subdued,
To more exalted soul he rais'd the man.
Ye shades of ancient heroes ye who toil'd

§ Sir Hugh Willoughby, sent by Queen Elizabet to discover the north-east passage.

Through long successive ages to build up
A labouring plan of state, behold at once
The wonder done! behold the matchless prince!
Who left his native throne, where reign'd till then
A mighty shadow of unreal power;

Who greatly spurn'd the slothful pomp of courts;
And, roaming every land, in every port
His sceptre laid aside, with glorious hand
Unwearied plying the mechanic tool,
Gather'd the seeds of trade, of useful arts,
Of civil wisdom, and of martial skill.

Charg'd with the stores of Europe, home he goes;
Then cities rise amid th' illumin'd waste :
O'er joyless deserts smiles the rural reign;
Far distant flood to flood is social join'd;
Th' astonish'd Euxine hears the Baltic roar;
Proud navies ride on seas that never foam'd
With daring keel before; and armies stretch
Each way their dazzling files, repressing here
The frantic Alexander of the north,

And awing there stern Othman's shrinking sons.
Sloth flies the land, and Ignorance, and Vice,
Of old dishonour proud: it glows around,
Taught by the royal hand that rous'd the whole,
One scene of arts, of arms, of rising trade:
For what his wiselom plann'd, and power enforc'd,
More potent still, his great example show'd.

Muttering, the winds at eve, with blunted point,
Blow hollow-blustering from the south. Subdued,
The frost resolves into a trickling thaw.
Spotted the mountains shine; loose sleet descends,
And floods the country round. The rivers swell,
Of bonds impatient. Sudden from the hills,
O'er rocks and woods, in broad brown cataracts,
A thousand snow-fed torrents shoot at once;
And, where they rush, the wide-resounding plain
Is left one slimy waste. Those sullen seas,
That wash'd th' ungenial Pole, will rest no more
Beneath the shackles of the mighty north;
But, rousing all their waves, resistless heave.
And hark: the lengthening roar continuous runs
Athwart the rifted deep: at once it bursts,
And piles a thousand mountains to the clouds.
Ill fares the bark with trembling wretches charg'd,
That, tost amid the floating fragments, moors
Beneath the shelter of an icy isle,

While night o'erwhelms the sea, and horrour looks
More horrible. Can human force endure

Th' assembled mischiefs that besiege them round?
Heart-gnawing hunger, fainting weariness,
The roar of winds and waves, the crush of ice,
Now ceasing, now renew'd with louder rage,
And in dire echoes bellowing round the main.
More to embroil the deep, Leviathan
And his unwieldy train, in dreadful sport, [gloom,
Tempest the loosen'd brine, while through the
Far from the bleak inhospitable shore,
Loading the winds, is heard the hungry howl
Of famish'd monsters, there awaiting wrecks.
Yet Providence, that ever-waking eye,
Looks down with pity on the feeble toil
Of mortals lost to hope, and lights them safe,
Through all this dreary labyrinth of fate. [glooms,
'Tis done! dread Winter spreads his latest
And reigns tremendous o'er the conquer'd year.
How dead the vegetable kingdom lies!
How dumb the tuneful! Horrour wide extends
His desolate domain. Behold, fond man!
See here thy pictur'd life; pass some few years,

455

Thy flowering Spring, thy Summer's ardent

strength,

Thy sober Autumn fading into age,

And pale concluding Winter comes at last,
And shuts the scene.
Ah! whither now are fled
Those dreams of greatness? those unsolid hopes
Of happiness? those longings after fame?
Those restless cares? those busy bustling days?
Those gay-spent, festive nights? those veering
thoughts,

Lost between good and ill, that shar'd thy life?
All now are vanish'd! Virtue sole survives,
Immortal, never-failing friend of man,

His guide to happiness on high. And see!
'Tis come, the glorious morn! the second birth
Of Heaven and Earth! awakening Nature hears
The new-creating word, and starts to life,
In every heighten'd form, from pain and death
For ever free. The great eternal scheme,
Involving all, and in a perfect whole
Uniting, as the prospect wider spreads,
To reason's eye refin'd clears up apace.
Ye vainly wise! ye blind presumptuous! now,
Confounded in the dust, adore that Power,
And Wisdom oft arraign'd; see now the cause,
Why unassuming Worth in secret liv'd,
And dy'd neglected: why the good man's share
In life was gall and bitterness of soul:
Why the lone widow and her orphans pin'd
In starving solitude; while Luxury,
In palaces, lay straining her low thought,
To form unreal wants: why heaven-born Truth,
And Moderation fair, wore the red marks
Of Superstition's scourge: why licens'd Pain,
That cruel spoiler, that embosom'd foe,
Imbitter'd all our bliss. Ye good distrest!
Ye noble few! who here unbending stand
Beneath life's pressure, yet bear up awhile,
And what your bounded view, which only saw
A little part, deem'd evil, is no more:
The storms of Wintery Time will quickly pass,
And one unbounded Spring encircle all.

A HYMN.

THESE, as they change, Almighty Father, these
Are but the varied God. The rolling year
Is full of thee. Forth in the pleasing Spring
Thy beauty walks, thy tenderness and love.
Wide flush the fields; the softening air is balm ;
Echo the mountains round; the forest smiles;
And every sense, and every heart, is joy.
Then comes thy glory in the Summer-months,
With light and heat refulgent. Then thy Sun
Shoots full perfection through the swelling year:
And oft thy voice in dreadful thunder speaks;
And oft at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve,
By brooks and groves, in hollow-whispering gales.
Thy bounty shines in Autumn unconfin'd,
And spreads a common feast for all that lives.
In Winter aweful thou! with clouds and storms
Around thee thrown, tempest o'er tempest roll'd,
Majestic darkness! on the whirlwind's wing,
Riding sublime, thou bidst the world adore,
And humblest nature with thy northern blast.

Mysterious round! what skill, what force divine,
Deep felt, in these appear! a simple train,
Yet so delightful mix'd, with such kind art,