By all you taught the Tuscan maids,
In changed Italia's modern shades;
By him, whose knight's distinguish'd name,
Refined a nation's lust of fame;
Whose tales e'en now, with echos sweet,
Castilia's Moorish hills repeat:
Or him,+ whom Seine's blue nymphs deplore,
In watchet weeds, on Gallia's shore;
Who drew the sad Sicilian maid,
By virtues in her sire betray'd:
O Nature boon, from whom proceed
Each forceful thought, each prompted deed;
If but from thee I hope to feel,
On all my heart imprint thy seal!
Let some retreating Cynic find
Those oft-turn'd scrolls I leave behind;
The Sports and I this hour agree,
To rove thy scene-full world with thee!
WHEN Music, heavenly maid, was young,
While yet in early Greece she sung,
The Passions oft, to hear her shell,
Throng'd around her magic cell,
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting,
Possest beyond the Muse's painting;
By turns they felt the glowing mind
Disturb'd, delighted, raised, refined:
'Till once, 'tis said, when all were fired,
Fill'd with fury, rapt, inspired,
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatch'd her instruments of sound,
And, as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forceful art,
+ Monsieur Le Sage, author of the incomparable Adventures of Gil Blas de Santillane, who died in Paris in the year 1745.
Each, for Madness ruled the hour,
Would prove his own expressive power.
First Fear his hand, its skill to try,
Amid the chords bewilder'd laid,
And back recoil'd, he knew not why,
E'en at the sound himself had made.
Next Anger rush'd, his eyes on fire,
In lightnings own'd his secret stings;
In one rude clash he struck the lyre,
And swept with hurried hand the strings.
With woeful measures wan Despair-
Low solemn sounds his grief beguiled,
A sullen, strange, and mingled air,
'Twas sad by fits, by starts 'twas wild.
But thou, O Hope! with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure?
Still it whisper'd promised pleasure,
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail!
Still would her touch the strain prolong,
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale,
She call'd on Echo still through all the song;
And where her sweetest theme she chose,
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close, And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden hair.
And longer had she sung,-but, with a frown,
Revenge impatient rose;
He threw his blood-stain'd sword in thunder down; And, with a withering look,
The war-denouncing trumpet took,
And blew a blast so loud and dread,
Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe!
And ever and anon he beat
The doubling drum with furious heat;
And though sometimes, each dreary pause between, Dejected Pity, at his side,
Her soul-subduing voice applied,
Yet still he kept his wild unalter'd mien,
While each strain'd ball of sight seem'd bursting from his head.
Thy numbers, Jealousy, to nought were fix'd,
Sad proof of thy distressful state!
Of differing themes the veering song was mix'd,
And now it courted Love, now raving call'd on Hate.
With eyes upraised, as one inspired,
Pale Melancholy sat retired;
And from her wild sequester'd seat,
In notes by distance made more sweet,
Pour'd through the mellow horn her pensive soul:
And, dashing soft from rocks around,
Bubbling runnels join'd the sound;
Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole,
Or o'er some haunted streams with fond delay,
Round an holy calm diffusing,
Love of peace and lonely musing, In hollow murmurs died away.
But O! how alter'd was its sprightlier tone! When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue, Her bow across her shoulders flung,
Her buskins gemm'd with morning dew,
Blew an inspiring air that dale and thicket rung, The hunter's call, to Faun and Dryad known. The oak-crown'd Sisters, and their chaste-eyed Queen, Satyrs and Sylvan boys were seen,
Peeping from forth their alleys green;
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear,
And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen spear.
Last came Joy's ecstatic trial;
He with vain crown advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand addrest; But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol,
Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best. They would have thought who heard the strain, They saw in Tempe's vale her native maids, Amidst the festal sounding shades,
To some unwearied minstrel dancing;
While, as his flying fingers kiss'd the strings,
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round;
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound;
And he, amidst his frolic play,
As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings.
O Music! sphere-descended maid,
Friend of Pleasure, Wisdom's aid!
Why, goddess, why, to us denied,
Lay'st thou thy ancient lyre aside ?
As, in that loved Athenian bower,
You learn'd an all-commanding power,
Thy mimic soul, O nymph endear'd!
Can well recall what then it heard.
Where is thy native simple heart,
Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art?
Arise, as in that elder time,
Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime!
Thy wonders, in that god-like age,
Fill thy recording Sister's page-
'Tis said, and I believe the tale,
Thy humblest reed could more prevail,
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age;
E'en all at once together found
Cecilia's mingled world of sound-
O bid our vain endeavours cease,
Revive the just designs of Greece:
Return in all thy simple state!
Confirm the tales her sons relate!
ADDRESSED TO SIR THOMAS HANMER,
On his Edition of Shakspeare's Works.
WHILE, born to bring the Muse's happier days,
A patriot's hand protects a poet's lays,
While nursed by you she sees her myrtles bloom
Green and unwither'd o'er his honour'd tomb;
Excuse her doubts, if yet she fears to tell
What secret transports in her bosom swell:
With conscious awe she hears the critic's fame,
And blushing hides her wreath at Shakspeare's name.
Hard was the lot those injured strains endured,
Unown'd by Science, and by years obscured:
Fair Fancy wept; and echoing sighs confess'd
A fixt despair in every tuneful breast.
Not with more grief th' afflicted swains appear,
When wintry winds deform the plenteous year;
When lingering frosts the ruin'd seats invade,
Where Peace resorted, and the Graces play'd.
Each rising art by just gradation moves,
Toil builds on toil, and age on age improves :
The Muse alone unequal dealt her rage,
And graced with noblest pomp her earliest stage.
Preserved through time, the speaking scenes impart
Each changeful wish of Phædra's tortured heart;
Or paint the curse that mark'd the *Theban's reign,
A bed incestuous, and a father slain.
With kind concern our pitying eyes o'erflow,
Trace the sad tale, and own another's woe.
To Rome removed, with wit secure to please,
The comic sisters kept their native ease :
With jealous fear declining Greece beheld
Her own Menander's art almost excell'd!
But every Muse essay'd to raise in vain
Some labour'd rival of her tragic strain;
Ilyssus' laurels, though transferr'd with toil,
Droop'd their fair leaves, nor knew th' unfriendly soil.
As Arts expired, resistless Dulness rose; Goths, priests, or Vandals,-all were Learning's foes, Till+ Julius first recall'd each exiled maid, And Cosmo own'd them in th' Etrurian shade: Then deeply skill'd in Love's engaging theme, The soft Provençal pass'd to Arno's stream: With graceful ease the wanton lyre he strung, Sweet flow'd the lays-but love was all he sung. The gay description could not fail to move; For, led by Nature, all are friends to love.
But Heaven, still various in its works, decreed The perfect boast of time should last succeed.
The Edipus of Sophocles.
Julius II. the immediate predecessor of Leo X.
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