PRECEPTS OF CONJUGAL HAPPINESS.
Pure in its source, and temperate in its way,
Still flows the same, nor finds its urn decay.
O bliss beyond what lonely life can know,
The soul-felt sympathy of joy and woe!
The magic charm which makes e'en sorrow dear,
And turns to pleasure the partaken tear !
Long, beauteous friend, to you may Heaven impart
The soft endearments of the social heart!
Long to your lot may every blessing flow,
That sense, or taste, or virtue can bestow!
And oh, forgive the zeal your peace inspires,
To teach that prudence which itself admires.
WARM from this heart while flows the faithful line,
The meanest friend of beauty shall be mine:
What Love, or Fame, or Fortune could bestow,
The charm of praise, the ease of life I owe
To Beauty present, or to Beauty fled,
To Hertford living, or Caernarvon dead,
To Tweedale's taste, to Edgecumbe's sense serene,
And (Envy spare this boast) to Britain's Queen!
Kind to the lay that all unlabour'd flow'd,
What Fancy caught, where Nature's pencil glow'd:*
She saw the path to new, though humble fame,
Gave me her praise, and left me fools to blame.
Strong in their weakness are each woman's charms,
Dread that endears, and softness that disarms:
The timorous eye retiring from applause,
And the mild air that fearfully withdraws,
Marks of her power these humble graces prove,
And, dash'd with pride, we deeper drink of Love.
Chief of those charms that hold the heart in thrall,
At thy fair shrine, O Modesty! we fall.
Not Cynthia rising o'er the watery way,
When on the dim wave falls her friendly ray;
Not the pure æther of Æolian skies,
That drinks the day's first glories as they rise;
Not all the tints from evening-clouds that break,
Burn in the beauties of the virgin's cheek;
When o'er that cheek, undisciplin❜d by art,
The sweet suffusion rushes from the heart.
Yet the soft blush, untutor'd to control,
The glow that speaks the susceptible soul,
Led by nice honour, and by decent pride,
The voice of ancient virtue taught to hide;
Taught beauty's bloom the searching eye to shun,
As early flowers blow fearful of the sun.
Far as the long records of time we trace,*
Still flow'd the Veil o'er Modesty's fair face:
The guard of beauty, in whose friendly shade,
Safe from each eye the featur'd soul is laid,—
The pensive thought that paler looks betray,
The tender grief that steals in tears away,
The hopeless wish that prompts the frequent sigh,
Bleeds in the blush, or melts upon the eye.
The man of faith through Gerar doom'd to stray,
A nation waiting his eventful way,
His fortune's fair companion at his side,
The world his promise, 'Providence his guide';
*Plato mentions two provinces in Persia, one of which was called the Queen's Girdle, the other the Queen's Veil, the reve nues of which, no doubt, were employed in purchasing those parts of her majesty's dress. It was about the middle of the third century, that the eastern women, on taking the vow of virginity, assumed that veil which had before been worn by the Pagan priestesses, and which is used by the religious among the Romanists now.
Once, more than virtue dar'd to value life,
And call'd a sister whom he own'd a wife:
Mistaken father of the faithful race,
Thy fears alone could purchase thy disgrace.
'Go, (to the fair, when conscious of the tale,
Said Gerar's Prince,) thy husband is thy veil."
O ancient faith! O virtue mourn'd in vain!
When Hymen's altar never held a stain;
When his pure torch shed undiminish'd rays,
And fires unholy died beneath the blaze!
For faith like this fair Greece was early known,
And claim'd the Veil's first honours as her own.
Ere half her sons, o'er Asia's trembling coast,
Arm'd to revenge one woman's virtue lost;
Ere he, whom Circe sought to charm in vain,
Follow'd wild fortune o'er the various main,
In youth's gay bloom he plied the' exulting oar,
From Ithaca's white rocks to Sparta's shore:
Free to Nerician galest the vessel glides,
And wild Eurotast smoothes his warrior tides;
For amorous Greece, when Love conducts the way,
Beholds her waters, and her winds obey.
No object her's but Love's impression knows,
No wave that wanders, and no breeze that blows;
Her groves, her mountains have his power confest,
And Zephyr sigh'd not but for Flora's breast.
He is the vaile of thine eyes to all that are with thee, and to all others. Gen. xx. 16, Vet. Trans.
From the mountain Neritos in Ithaca, now called Nericia.
The Spartan river.
E merite d'Alberghe amore.-Tasso.
'Twas then his sighs in sweetest whispers stray'd,
Far o'er Laconia's plains from Eva's* shade;
When soft-ey'd Spring resum'd his mantle gay,
And lean'd luxurious on the breast of May,
Love's genial banners young Ulysses bore,
From Ithaca's white rocks to Sparta's shore.
With all that soothes the heart, that wins, or warms,
All princely virtues, and all manly charms,
All Love can urge, or Eloquence persuade,
The future hero woo'd his Spartan maid.
Yet long he woo'd-in Sparta slow to yield,
Beauty like valour long maintain❜d the field :-
'No bloom so fair Messene's banks disclose,
No breath so pure o'er Tempe's bosom blows;
No smile so radiant throws the genial ray
Through the fair eye-lids of the opening day;
But deaf to vows with fondest passion prest,
Cold as the wave of Hebrus' wintry breast,
Penelope regards no lover's pain,
And owns Ulysses eloquent in vain.
To vows that vainly waste their warmth in air, Insidious hopes that lead but to despair; Affections lost, desires the heart must rue, And Love, and Sparta's joyless plains, adieu!
'Yet still this bosom shall one passion share,
Still shall my country find a father there.
Ev'n now the children of my little reign
Demand that father of the faithless main;
*A mountain in Peloponnesus.
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