Is this complex stupendous scheme of things. 855 But, tho' conceal'd, to every purer eye

Th' informing Author in his works appears: Chief, lovely Spring, in thee, and thy soft

scenes,

The SMILING GOD is seen; while water, earth,

And air attest his bounty; which exalts 860
The brute-creation to this finer thought,
And annual melts their undesigning hearts
Profusely thus in tenderness and joy.

STILL let my song a nobler note assume, And sing th' infusive force of Spring on Man, 865 When heaven and earth, as if contending, vye To raise his being, and serene his soul. Can he forbear to join the general smile Of Nature? Can fierce passions vex his breast, While every gale is peace, and every grove 870 Is melody? Hence! from the bounteous walks Of flowing spring, ye sordid sons of earth, Hard, and unfeeling of another's woe;' Or only lavish to yourselves; away!

But come, ye generous minds, in whose wide

Of all his works,

thought,

CREATIVE

burns

BOUNTY

876

With warmest beam; and on your open frent And liberal eye, sits, from his dark retreat

Inviting modest Want. Nor, till invok'd,
Can restless goodness wait; your active

Leaves no cold wintry corner unexplor'd;
Like silent-working HEAVEN, surprizing oft
The lonely heart with unexpected good.
For you the roving spirit of the wind
Blows Spring abroad; for you the teaming

clouds

Descend in gladsome plenty o'er the world; 885
And the sun sheds his kindest rays for you,
Ye flower of human race!
In these green

days,

Reviving Sickness lifts her languid head;
Life flows afresh; and young-ey'd Health

To purchase. Pure Serenity apace

Induces thought, and Contemplation still.
By swift degrees the love of Nature works, 895
And warms the bosom; till at last sublim'd
To rapture, and enthusiastic heat,

We feel the present DEITY, and taste

The joy of GOD to see a happy world!

THESE are the sacred feelings of thy

heart,

900

Thy heart inform'd by reason's purer ray, O LYTTELTON, the friend! thy passions thus

And meditations vary, as at large, Courting the Muse, thro' HAGLEY-PARK thou strayest;

Thy British Temple! There along the dale, 905 With woods o'er-hung, and shagg'd with mossy rocks,

Whence on each hand the gushing waters

play,

And down the rough cascade white-dashing

fall,

Or gleam in lengthen'd vista' thro' the trees, You silent steal; or sit beneath the shade 910 Of solemn oaks, that tuft the swelling mounts Thrown graceful round by Nature's careless hand,

And pensive listen to the various voice Of rural peace: the herds, the flocks, the · birds,

The hollow-whispering breeze, the plaint of rills,

That, purling down amid the twisted roots 916 Which creep around, their dewy murmurs shake

On the sooth'd ear. From these abstracted oft,

You wander thro' the philosophic world; Where in bright train continual wonders rise,

920

Or to the curious or the pious eye.
And oft, conducted by historic truth,
You tread the long extent of backward time:
Planning, with warm benevolence of mind,
And honest zeal unwarp'd by party-rage 925
BRITANNIA's weal; how from the venal
gulph

To raise her virtue, and her arts revive.
Or, turning thence

thy view, these graver

thoughts

The Muses charm: while, with sure taste

refin'd,

You draw th' inspiring breath of ancient

song;

930

935

Till nobly rises, emulous, thy own.
Perhaps thy lov'd LUCINDA shares thy walk,
With soul to thine attun'd. Then Nature all
Wears to the lover's eye a look of love;
And all the tumult of a guilty world,
Tost by ungenerous passions, sinks away.
The tender heart is animated peace;
And as it pours its copious treasures forth,
In varied converse, softening every theme,
You, frequent-pausing, turn, and from her

eyes,

Where meeken'd sense, and amiable grace,

940.

And lively sweetness dwell, enraptur'd, drink That nameless spirit of ethereal joy, Inimitable happiness! which love,

Alone, bestows, and on a favour'd few. 945 Meantime you gain the height, from whose fair brow

The bursting prospect spreads immense around; And snatch'd o'er hill and dale, and wood and

lawn,

And verdant field, and darkening heath between,

And villages embosom'd soft in trees,

950

And spiry towns by surging columns mark'd Of houshold smoak, smoak, your eye excursive

roams:

Wide-stretching from the Hall, in whose kind

haunt

The Hospitable Genius lingers still,

To where the broken landskip, by degrees, 955 Ascending, roughens into rigid hills;

O'er which the Cambrian mountains, like far clouds

That skirt the blue horizon, dusky rise.

FLUSH'D by the spirit of the genial year, Now from the virgin's cheek a fresher

bloom

960

Shoots, less and less, the live carnation

round: