Who most to shun or hate mankind pretend, If all are equal in their happiness: But mutual wants this happiness increase, Fortune her gifts may variously dispose, Not present good or ill the joy or curse, Or God and nature meant to mere mankind, SWEETNESS. AN ODE. BY MR. ROBERTSON. Or damask cheeks and radiant eyes, Let other poets tell; Within the bosom of the fair Superior beauties dwell. There all the sprightly powers of wit, In blithe assemblage play; There every social virtue sheds Its intellectual ray, But as the sun's refulgent light This mental beam dilates the heart, It harmonizes every thought, And heightens every trace. One glimpse can soothe the troubled breast, The heaving sigh restrain; Can make the bed of sickness please, And stop the sense of pain. Its power can charm the savage heart, To smiles convert the wildest rage, And melt the soul to love. When sweetness beams upon the throne, In majesty benign, The awful splendours of a crown With milder lustre shine. In scenes of poverty and woe, Thus, when the blooming spring returns, To cheer the mournful plains, Through earth and air, with genial warmth, Ethereal mildness reigns. Beneath its bright auspicious beam And baleful discord flies. A thousand nameless beauties spring, A smiling train of joys appear, Unbounded Charity displays And Friendship's pure seraphic flame Almighty Love exerts his power, Nor shall the storms of age, which cloud Each gleam of sensual joy, And blast the gaudy flow'ret's pride, These blest effects destroy. When that fair form shall sink in years, And all those graces fly; The beauty of thy heavenly mind CONJUGAL FELICITY. FROM THOMSON'S SEASONS. O HAPPY they! the happiest of their kind! Unnatural oft and foreign to the mind, That binds their peace, but harmony itself, Attuning all their passions into love: Where friendship full exerts her softest power, Perfect esteem, enliven'd by desire Ineffable, and sympathy of soul: Thought meeting thought, and will preventing will, With boundless confidence: for naught but love Can answer love, and render bliss secure. -What is the world to them, Its pomp, its pleasure, and its nonsense all, Something than beauty dearer, should they look |