Fame through Thebaïs his arrival spread, Half his old friends reproach'd him, and half fled : Of help and common countenance bereft, No creature own'd him, but a dog he left. Compunction touch'd his soul, and, wiser made By bitter suff'rings, he resumed his trade : Thank'd Heav'n for want of power and want of pelf, That he had lost the world, and found himself. Conscience and charity revived their part, And true humility enrich'd the heart, While grace celestial with enliv'ning ray Beam'd forth, to gild the evening of his day. His neighbours mark'd the change, and each man strove By slow degrees t' applaud him, and to love. So Peter, when his tim'rous guilt was o'er, Emerged, and stood twice firmer than before. CONTENTMENT, INDUSTRY, AND ACQUIESCENCE WHY dwells my unoffended eye On yon blank desert's trackless waste; Supremely gracious Deity, Tremble, and yonder Alp behold, For nature rarely form'd a soil Supremely gracious Deity, Scipio sought virtue in his prime, He served the state with zeal and force, Supremely gracious Deity, When Diocletian sought repose, For fools t' admire, and rogues devour: Supremely gracious Deity, He, who had ruled the world, exchanged Supremely gracious Deity, Thus Charles, with justice styled the great Resign'd two empires to retreat, And from a throne to shades withdraws; In vain (to sooth a monarch's pride,) His yoke the willing Persian bore : In vain the Saracen complied, And fierce Northumbrians stain'd with gore. One Gallic farm his cares confined; And all from thee, Supremely gracious Deity, Composer of the mind! Observant of th' almighty will, Prescient in faith, and pleased with toil, Abram Chaldea left, to till The moss-grown Haran's flinty soil: Supremely gracious Deity, ANONYMOUS. FROM THE ANNUAL REGISTER FOR 1774. VERSES, Copied from the window of an obscure lodging-house, in the neighbourhood of London. Ah! once to fame and bright dominion born, The first, the fairest daughter of the skies. Then, when at heaven's prolific mandate sprung And hills, and dales, and rocks, and valleys rung; The sun exulted in his glorious round, And shouting planets in their courses sung. For ever then I led the constant year; Saw youth, and joy, and love's enchanting wiles; Saw the mild graces in my train appear, And infant beauty brighten in my smiles. No Winter frown'd. In sweet embrace allied, Three sister seasons danced th' eternal green; And Spring's retiring softness gently vied With Autumn's blush, and Summer's lofty mien. Too soon, when man profaned the blessings giv'n, And vengeance arm'd to blot a guilty age, With bright Astrea to my native heav'n I fled, and flying saw the deluge rage; Saw bursting clouds eclipse the noontide beams, While sounding billows from the mountains roll'd, With bitter waves polluting all my streams, My nectar'd streams, that flow'd on sands of gold. Then vanish'd many a sea-girt isle and grove, Their forests floating on the wat❜ry plain : Then, famed for arts and laws derived from Jove, My Atalantis sunk beneath the main. No longer bloom'd primæval Eden's bow'rs, Nor guardian dragons watch'd th' Hesperian steep: With all their fountains, fragrant fruits and flow'rs, No more to dwell in sylvan scenes I deign'd, tain'd, And waked her slumb'ring atoms into birth. And ev'ry echo taught my raptured name, And ev'ry virgin breath'd her am'rous vows, Ah me! for now a younger rival claims O say what yet untasted beauties flow, And warbles Philomel a softer strain? Do morning suns in ruddier glory rise ? When silence listens at the midnight hour. By Europe's laws, and senates' stern command? Ungen'rous Europe! let me fly thy soil, And waft my treasures to a grateful land; Again revive, on Asia's drooping shore, My Daphne's groves, or Lycia's ancient plain ; Again to Afric's sultry sands restore Embow'ring shades, and Lybian Ammon's fane: Or haste to northern Zembla's savage coast, There hush to silence elemental strife; Brood o'er the regions of eternal frost, And swell her barren womb with heat and life. Then Britain-Here she ceased. Indignant grief, And parting pangs, her falt ring tongue suppress'd: Veil'd in an amber cloud she sought relief, And tears and silent anguish told the rest. SONG TO * WHAT! bid me seek another fair In untried paths of female wiles? And posies weave of other hair, And bask secure in other smiles? Thy friendly stars no longer prize, And light my course by other eyes? Ah no!-my dying lips shall close, Unalter'd love, as faith, professing; Nor praising him who life bestows, Forget who makes that gift a blessing. My last address to Heaven is due ; The last but one is all-to you. IN Phœbus' region while some bards there be Beneath their laurel'd praise my verse may give, To trace the features of unnoticed man ; Deeds, else forgotten, in the verse may live! Her lore, mayhap, instructive sense may teach, From weeds of humbler growth within my lowly reach. A wight there was, who single and alone Had crept from vigorous youth to waning age, Nor e'er was worth, nor e'er was beauty known His heart to captive, or his thought engage: Some feeble joyaunce, though his conscious mind Might female worth or beauty give to wear, Yet to the nobler sex he held confined The genuine graces of the soul sincere, And well could show with saw or proverb quaint All semblance woman's soul,and all her beauty paint. In plain attire this wight apparel'd was, (For much he conn'd of frugal lore and knew) Nor, till some day of larger note might cause, From iron-bound chest his better garb he drew: But when the Sabbath-day might challenge more, Or feast, or birth-day, should it chance to be, A glossy suit devoid of stain he wore, And gold his buttons glanced so fair to see, Gold clasp'd his shoon, by maiden brush'd so sheen, And his rough beard he shaved, and donn'd his linen clean. But in his common garb a coat he wore, A faithful coat that long its lord had known, That once was black, but now was black no more, Attinged by various colours not its own. All from his nostrils was the front imbrown'd, And down the back ran many a greasy line, While, here and there, his social moments own'd The generous signet of the purple wine. Brown o'er the bent of eld his wig appear'd, Like fox's trailing tail by hunters sore affeir'd. One only maid he had, like turtle true, But not like turtle gentle, soft, and kind ; For many a time her tongue bewray'd the shrew, And in meet words unpack'd her peevish mind. Ne form'd was she to raise the soft desire That stirs the tingling blood in youthful vein, Ne form'd was she to light the tender fire, By many a bard is sung in many a strain : Hook'd was her nose, and countless wrinkles told What no man durst to her, I ween, that she was old. When the clock told the wonted hour was come When from his nightly cups the wight withdrew, Right patient would she watch his wending home, His feet she heard, and soon the bolt she drew. If long his time was past, and leaden sleep O'er her tired eye-lids 'gan his reign to stretch, Oft would she curse that men such hours should keep, And many a saw 'gainst drunkenness would preach; Haply if potent gin had arm'd her tongue, All on the reeling wight a thundering peal she rung. For though the blooming queen of Cyprus' isle Its medicine, oft a cholic-pain will call, So as in single animals he joy'd, One cat, and eke one dog, his bounty fed; The first the cate-devouring mice destroy'd, Thieves heard the last, and from his threshold fled : All in the sun-beams bask'd the lazy cat, Her mottled length in couchant posture laid; On one accustom'd chair while Pompey sat, And loud he bark'd should Puss his right invade. The human pair oft mark'd them as they lay, And haply sometimes thought like cat and dog were they. A room he had that faced the southern ray, Where books he kept of old research and new, For still in form he placed his chief delight, And oft with careful eye their ranks review'd; A Club select there was, where various talk And oft on politics the preachments ran, If a pipe lent its thought-begetting fume: And oft important matters would they scan, And deep in council fix a nation's doom: And oft they chuckled loud at jest or jeer, Or bawdy tale the most, thilk much they loved to hear. For men like him they were of like consort, Thilk much the honest muse must needs condemn, Who made of women's wiles their wanton sport, And bless'd their stars that kept the curse from them! No honest love they knew, no melting smile That shoots the transports to the throbbing Thilk knew they not but in a harlot's guile [heart! Lascivious smiling through the mask of art : And so of women deem'd they as they knew, And from a Demon's traits an Angel's picture drew. But most abhorr'd they Hymeneal rites, And boasted oft the freedom of their fate : Nor 'vail'd, as they opined, its best delytes Those ills to balance that on wedlock wait; And often would they tell of hen-peck'd fool Snubb'd by the hard behest of sour-eyed dame. And vow'd no tongue-arm'd woman's freakish rule Their mirth should quail, or damp their generous flame: Then pledged their hands, and toss'd their bumpers o'er, And Io! Bacchus ! sung, and own'd no other pow'r. If e'er a doubt of softer kind arose Within some breast of less obdurate frame, Lo! where its hideous form a Phantom shows Full in his view, and Cuckold is its name. Him Scorn attended with a glance askew, And Scorpion Shame for delicts not his own, Her painted bubbles while Suspicion blew, And vex'd the region round the Cupid's throne: "Far be from us," they cry'd, "the treach'rous bane, "Far be the dimply guile, and far the flowery chain !" NN |