Exhibit every lineament of these.
Come then, and added to thy many crowns,
Receive yet one, as radiant as the rest,
Due to thy last and moft effectual work,
Thy word fulfilled, the conquest of a world!
He is the happy man,
whose life e'en now Shows somewhat of that happier life to come; Who, doomed to an obscure but tranquil state, Is pleased with it, and, were he free to choose, Would make his fate his choice; whom peace, thefruit Of virtue, and whom virtue, fruit of faith, Prepare for happiness; bespeak him one Content indeed to sojourn while he must Below the skies, but having there his home. The world o'erlooks him in her busy search Of objects, more illustrious in her view; And, occupied as earnestly as she, Though more sublimely, he o'erlooks the world. She scorns his pleasures, for the knows them not; He seeks not her's, for he has proved them vain. He cannot skim the ground like summer birds Pursuing gilded flies; and such he deems Her honours, her emoluments, her joys. Therefore in contemplation is his bliss, Whose power is such, that whom she lifts from earth
She makes familiar with a heaven unseen,
And shows him glories yet to be revealed.
Not Nothful he, though seeming unemployed,
And censured oft as useless. Stilleft ftreams
Oft water faireft meadows, and the bird,
That flutters leaft, is longest on the wing.
Ask him, indeed, what trophies
has raised,
Or what achievements of immortal fame
He purposes, and he shall answer-None.
His warfare is within. There unfatigued
His fervent fpirit labours. There he fights,
And there obtains fresh triumphs o'er himself,
And never withering wreaths, compared with which
The laurels that a Cæsar reaps are weeds.
Perhaps the self-approving haughty world,
That as she sweeps him with her whistling filks
Scarce deigns to notice him, or, if the see,
Deems him a cypher in the works of God,
Receives advantage from his noiselefs hours,
Of which she little dreams. Perhaps the owes
Her sunshine and her rain, her blooming spring
And plenteous harveft, to the prayer he makes,
When, Isaac like, the solitary faint
Walks forth to meditate at even-tide,
And think on her, who thinks not for herself,
Forgive him then, thou buftler in concerns
Of little worth, an idler in the beft,
If, author of no mischief and some good,
He seek his proper happiness by means,
That may advance, but cannot hinder, thine.
Nor, though he tread the fecret path of life,
Engage no notice, and enjoy much ease,
Account him an incumbrance on the state,
Receiving benefits, and rendering none.
His sphere though humble, if that humble sphere
Shine with his fair example, and though small
His influence, if that influence all be spent
In soothing forrow and in quenching ftrife,
In aiding helpless indigence, in works,
From which at least a grateful few derive
Some taste of comfort in a world of wo,
Then let the supercilious grcat confess
He serves his country, recompenses well
The ftate, beneath the shadow of whose vine
He fits secure, and in the scale of life
Holds no ignoble, though a slighted, place.
The man, whose virtues are more felt than seen,
Must drop indeed the hope of public praise ;
But he may boast what few that win it can,
That if his country stand not by his skill,
At least his follies have not wrought her fall.
Polite refinement offers him in vain
Her golden tube, through which a fenfual world
Draws gross impurity, and likes it well,
The neat conveyance hiding all the offence.
Not that he peevishly rejects a mode
Because that world adopts it. If it bear
The stamp and clear impression of good sense,
And be not costly more than of true worth,
it
on,
and for decorum fake
Can wear it e'en as gracefully as she.
She judges of refinement by the eye,
He by the test of conscience, and a heart
Not soon deceived ; aware that what is base
No polish can make sterling; and that vice,
Though well perfumed and elegantly dressed,
Like an unburied carcafe tricked with flowers,
Is but a garnished nuisance, fitter far
For cleanly riddance than for fair attire.
So life glides smoothly and by stealth away,
More golden than that age of fabled gold
Renowned in ancient song; not vexed with care
Or stained with guilt, beneficent, approved
Of God and man, and peaceful in its end.
So glide my life away! and so at laft,
My share of duties decently fulfilled,
May fome disease, not tardy to perform
Its destined office, yet with gentle stroke,
Difiniss me weary to a safe retreat,
Beneath the turf, that I have often trod.
It shall not grieve me then, that once, when called
To dress a Sofa with the flowers of verse,
I played awhile, obedient to the fair, ,
With that light talk; but soon, to please her more,
Whom flowers alone I knew would little please,
Let fall the unfinished wreath, and roved for fruit;
Roved far, and gathered much: some harsh, 'tis true,
Picked from the thorns and briars of reproof,
But wholesome, well-digested; grateful fome
To palates, that can taste immortal truth;
Infipid else, and sure to be despised.
But all is in his hand, whose praise I seek.
In vain the poet sings, and the world hears,
If he regard not, though divine the theme.
'Tis not in artful measures, in the chime
And idle tinkling of a minftrel's lyre,
To charm his ear, whose eye is on the heart;
Whose frown can disappoint the proudeft ftrain,
Whose approbation-profper even mine.
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