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ODE TO PITY.

[IBID.]

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THOU, the friend of man assign'd, With balmy hands his wounds to bind,

And charm his frantic wo:

When first Distress, with dagger keen, Broke forth to waste his destin'd scene, His wild unsated foe!

By Pella's bard, a magic name,
By all the griefs his thought could frame,
Receive my humble rite:

Long, Pity, let the nations view

Thy sky-worn robes of tenderest blue,
And eyes of dewy light!

But wherefore need I wander wide

To old Ilissus' distant side,

Deserted stream, and mute?

Wild Arun too has heard thy strains,
And Echo, midst my native plains,
Been sooth'd by Pity's lute,

There first the wren thy myrtles shed
On gentlest Otway's infant head,

To him thy cell was shewn;

And, while he sung the female heart, With youth's soft notes, unspoil'd by art, Thy turtles mix'd their own.

Come, Pity, come; by Fancy's aid,
E'en now my thoughts, relenting maid,
Thy temple's pride design :
Its southern site, its truth complete,
Shall raise a wild enthusiast heat
In all who view the shrine.

There Picture's toil shall well relate,
How chance, or hard involving fate,
O'er mortal bliss prevail :

The buskin'd Muse shall near her stand,
And sighing prompt her tender hand,
With each disastrous tale.

There let me oft, retir'd by day,
In dreams of passion melt away,

Allow'd with thee to dwell:

There waste the mournful lamp of night, Till, Virgin, thou again delight

To hear a British shell!

[IBID.]

Ir aught of oaten stop, or pastoral song,
May hope, chaste Eve, to sooth thy modest ear,
Like thy own solemn springs,

Thy springs, and dying gales;

O Nymph reserv'd, while now the bright-hair'd sun Sits in yon western tent, whose cloudy skirts,

With brede ethereal wove,

O'erhang his wavy bed:

Now air is hush'd, save where the weak-ey'd bat
With short shrill shriek flits by on leathern wing;
Or where the beetle winds

His small but sullen horn,

As oft he rises 'midst the twilight path,
Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum:
Now teach me, maid compos'd,

To breathe some soften'd strain,

Whose numbers, stealing through thy dark'ning vale, May not unseemly with its stillness suit ;

As, musing slow, I hail

Thy genial lov'd return!

For when thy folding-star arising shews
His paly circlet, at his warning lamp
The fragrant Hours, and Elves
Who slept in buds the day,

And many a Nymph who wreathes her brows with sedge,
And sheds the fresh'ning dew; and, lovelier still,
The pensive Pleasures sweet,

Prepare thy shadowy car.

Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene;
Or find some ruin, 'midst its dreary dells,
Whose walls more awful nod

By thy religious gleams.

Or, if chill blustering winds, or driving rain,
Prevent my willing feet, be mine the hut,
That, from the mountain's side,

Views wilds, and swelling floods,

And hamlets brown, and dim-discover'd spires ;
And hears their simple bell; and marks o'er all
Thy dewy fingers draw

The gradual dusky veil.

While Spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont,
And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest Eve!
While Summer loves to sport
Beneath thy lingering light;

While sallow Autumn fills thy lap with leaves;
Or Winter, yelling through the troublous air,
Affrights thy shrinking train,

And rudely rends thy robes;

So long, regardful of thy quiet rule,

Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science, smiling Peace,
Thy gentlest influence own,

And love thy favourite name!

ODE TO SIMPLICITY.

[IBID.]

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THOU, by Nature taught

To breathe her genuine thought,

In numbers warmly pure, and sweetly strong;

Who first on mountains wild,

In Fancy, loveliest child,

Thy babe, and Pleasure's, nurs'd the powers of song!

Thou, who, with hermit heart,
Disdain'st the wealth of art,

And gauds, and pageant weeds, and trailing pall;

But com'st a decent maid,

In attic robe array'd,

O chaste, unboastful Nymph, to thee I call!

By all the honey'd store,

On Hybla's thymy shore;

By all her blooms, and mingled murmurs dear;

By her whose love-lorn wo,

In evening musings slow,

Sooth'd, sweetly sad, Electra's poet's ear:

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