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Eternity's unknown expanse appears,
Circling around and limiting his years.
The busy race examine, and explore

Each creek and cavern of the dangerous shore,
With care collect what in their eyes excels,
Some shining pebbles, and some weeds and shells;
Thus laden, dream that they are rich and great,
And happiest he that groans beneath his weight.
The waves o'ertake them in their serious play,
And every hour sweeps multitudes away;
They shriek and sink, survivors start and weep,
Pursue their sport, and follow to the deep.
A few forsake the throng; with lifted eyes
Ask wealth of Heaven, and gain a real prize,
Truth, wisdom, grace, and peace like that above,
Sealed with His signet whom they serve and love;
Scorned by the rest, with patient hope they wait
A kind release from their imperfect state,
And unregretted are soon snatched away
From scenes of sorrow into glorious day.

VARIOUS MOTIVES TO RETIREMENT.

Nor these alone prefer a life recluse,
Who seek retirement for its proper use;
The love of change, that lives in every breast,
Genius, and temper, and desire of rest,
Discordant motives in one centre meet,
And each inclines its votary to retreat.
Some minds by nature are averse to noise,
And hate the tumult half the world enjoys,
The lure of avarice, or the pompous prize,
That courts display before ambitious eyes;
The fruits that hang on pleasure's flowery stem,
Whate'er enchants them, are no snares to them.
To them the deep recess of dusky groves,
Or forest, where the deer securely roves,
The fall of waters, and the song of birds,
And hills that echo to the distant herds,
Are luxuries excelling all the glare

The world can boast, and her chief favorites share.

THE POET SEEKS RETIREMENT; NATURE'S PICTURES FOR HIM.
With eager step, and carelessly arrayed,
For such a cause the poet seeks the shade.
From all he sees he catches new delight,
Pleased fancy claps her pinions at the sight;
The rising or the setting orb of day,
The clouds that flit, or slowly float away,
Nature in all the various shapes she wears,
Frowning in storms, or breathing gentle airs;
The snowy robe her wintry state assumes,
Her summer heats, her fruits, and her perfumes;
All, all alike transport the glowing bard,
Success in rhyme his glory and reward.

NATURE INVOKED TO INSPIRE THE POET.

O Nature! whose elysian scenes disclose
His bright perfections at whose word they rose,
Next to that Power who formed thee and sustains,
strains.
my
Be thou the great inspirer of

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Still, as I touch the lyre, do thou expand
Thy genuine charms, and guide an artless hand,
That I may catch a fire but rarely known,
Give useful light, though I should miss renown,
And, poring on thy page, whose every line
Bears proof of an intelligence divine,
May feel a heart enriched by what it pays,
That builds its glory on its Maker's praise.
Woe to the man, whose wit disclaims its use,
Glittering in vain or only to seduce.
Who studies nature with a wanton eye,
Admires the work, but slips the lesson by ;
His hours of leisure and recess employs
In drawing pictures of forbidden joys,
Retires to blazon his own worthless name,
Or shoot the careless with a surer aim.

THE LOVER SEEKS

RETIREMENT. HIS SIGHS. HIS
IDOLATRY.

The lover too shuns business and alarms,
Tender idolater of absent charms.
Saints offer nothing in their warmest prayers,
That he devotes not with a zeal like theirs ;
"T is consecration of his heart, soul, time,
And every thought that wanders is a crime.
In sighs he worships his supremely fair,
And weeps a sad libation in despair;
Adores a creature, and, devout in vain,
Wins in return an answer of disdain.

MISCHIEFS OF BEING IN LOVE.IT REFINES, BUT UNMANS. -
LOVERS UNMANAGEABLE.

As woodbine weds the plant within her reach,
Rough elm, or smooth-grained ash, or glossy beech,
In spiral rings ascends the trunk, and lays
Her golden tassels on the leafy sprays,
But does a mischief while she lends a grace,
Straitening its growth by such a strict embrace,
So love, that clings around the noblest minds,
Forbids the advancement of the soul he binds;
The suitor's air indeed he soon improves,
And forms it to the taste of her he loves,
Teaches his eye a language, and no less
Refines his speech, and fashions his address;
But farewell promises of happier fruits,
Manly designs, and learning's grave pursuits;
Girt with a chain he cannot wish to break,
His only bliss is sorrow for her sake;
Who will may pant for glory and excel,-
Her smile his aim, all higher aims farewell!
Thyrsis, Alexis, or whatever name
May least offend against so pure a flame,
Though sage advice of friends the most sincere
Sounds harshly in so delicate an ear,
And lovers, of all creatures, tame or wild,
Can least brook management, however mild;
Yet let a poet (poetry disarms
The fiercest animals with magic charms)
Risk an intrusion on thy pensive mood,
And woo and win thee to thy proper good.

46

ADVICE TO THE LOVER. BAD EFFECTS OF RURALITIES ON
HIM. RECALLED TO DUTY.

Pastoral images and still retreats,
Umbrageous walks and solitary seats,
Sweet birds in concert with harmonious streams,
Soft airs, nocturnal vigils, and day-dreams,
Are all enchantments in a case like thine,
Conspire against thy peace with one design,
Soothe thee to make thee but a surer prey,
And feed the fire that wastes thy powers away.
Up-God has formed thee with a wiser view,
Not to be led in chains, but to subdue;
Calls thee to cope with enemies, and first
Points out a conflict with thyself, the worst.

WOMAN, HER TRUE POSITION; TO BE BELOVED, NOT ADORED.
Woman, indeed, a gift He would bestow

When He designed a paradise below,
The richest earthly boon his hands afford,
Deserves to be beloved, but not adored.
Post away swiftly to more active scenes,
Collect the scattered truths that study gleans,
Mix with the world, but with its wiser part,
No longer give an image all thine heart;
Its empire is not hers, nor is it thine,-
"T is God's just claim, prerogative divine.

HEBERDEN. THE DISEASE OF MELANCHOLY DESCRIBED; ITS
NEED OF SYMPATHY.—JOB.

Virtuous and faithful Heberden! whose skill
Attempts no task it cannot well fulfil,
Gives melancholy up to Nature's care,
And sends the patient into purer air.

Look where he comes- in this embowered alcove
Stand close concealed, and see a statue move :
Lips busy, and eyes fixed, foot falling slow,
Arms hanging idly down, hands clasped below,
Interpret to the marking eye distress,
Such as its symptoms can alone express.
That tongue is silent now; that silent tongue
Could argue once, could jest or join the song.
Could give advice, could censure or commend,
Or charm the sorrows of a drooping friend.
Renounced alike its office and its sport,
Its brisker and its graver strains fall short;
Both fail beneath a fever's secret sway,
And like a summer-brook are past away.
This is a sight for pity to peruse,
Till she resemble faintly what she views,
Till sympathy contract a kindred pain,
Pierced with the woes that she laments in vain.
This, of all maladies that man infest,

Claims most compassion, and receives the least:
Job felt it, when he groaned beneath the rod
And the barbed arrows of a frowning God;
And such emollients as his friends could spare
Friends such as his for modern Jobs prepare.
MODERN JOB'S COMFORTERS SATIRIZED. SORROW IS SACRED ;
A REALITY AND NOT A FANTASY.

Blessed, rather cursed, with hearts that never
feel,

Kept snug in caskets of close-hammered steel,

With mouths made only to grin wide and eat,
And minds that deem derided pain a treat,
With limbs of British oak, and nerves of wire,
And wit that puppet-prompters might inspire,
Their sovereign nostrum is a clumsy joke
On pangs enforced with God's severest stroke.
But, with a soul that ever felt the sting
Of sorrow, sorrow is a sacred thing:
Not to molest, or irritate, or raise

A laugh at his expense, is slender praise;
He that has not usurped the name of man
Does all, and deems too little all, he can,
T' assuage the throbbings of the festered part,
And staunch the bleedings of a broken heart.
'Tis not, as heads that never ache suppose,
Forgery of fancy, and a dream of woes;
Man is a harp, whose chords elude the sight,
Each yielding harmony disposed aright;
The screws reversed (a task which, if He please,
God in a moment executes with case),

Ten thousand thousand strings at once go loose,
Lost, till He tunes them, all their power and use.

SCENES OF NATURE CANNOT CURE THE WOUNDED SPIRIT.GOD ITS ONLY PHYSICIAN.

Then neither heathy wilds, nor scenes as fair As ever recompensed the peasant's care, Nor soft declivities with tufted hills, Nor view of waters turning busy mills, Parks in which Art preceptress Nature weds, Nor gardens interspersed with flowery beds, Nor gales, that catch the scent of blooming groves, And waft it to the mourner as he roves, Can call up life into his faded eye, That passes all he sees unheeded by ; No wounds like those a wounded spirit feels, No cure for such, till God, who makes them, heals, And thou, sad sufferer under nameless ill, That yields not to the touch of human skill, Improve the kind occasion, understand

A Father's frown, and kiss his chastening hand.

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PEACE MADE WITH GOD CHANGES THE WHOLE ASPECT OF
NATURE, FROM GLOOM TO GLADNESS AND DELIGHT.
To thee the dayspring and the blaze of noon,
The purple evening and resplendent moon,
The stars, that, sprinkled o'er the vault of night,
Seem drops descending in a shower of light,
Shine not, or undesired and hated shine,
Seen through the medium of a cloud like thine:
Yet seek Him, — in his favor life is found,
All bliss beside, a shadow or a sound :
Then heaven, eclipsed so long, and this dull earth,
Shall seem to start into a second birth;
Nature, assuming a more lovely face,
Borrowing a beauty from the works of Grace,
Shall be despised and overlooked no more,
Shall fill thee with delight unfelt before,
Impart to things inanimate a voice,
And bid her mountains and her hills rejoice;
The sound shall run along the winding vales,
And thou enjoy an Eden ere it fails.

THE DISAPPOINTED STATESMAN SEEKS RETIREMENT.

Ye groves (the statesman at his desk exclaims,
Sick of a thousand disappointed aims),
My patrimonial treasure and my pride,
Beneath your shades your gray possessor hide,
Receive me languishing for that repose
The servant of the public never knows.
Ye saw me once (ah, those regretted days,
When boyish innocence was all my praise !)
Hour after hour delightfully allot

To studies then familiar, since forgot,
And cultivate a taste for ancient song,
Catching its ardor as I mused along ;
Nor seldom, as propitious Heaven might send,
What once I valued and could boast, a friend,
Were witnesses how cordially I pressed
His undissembling virtue to my breast;
Receive me now, not incorrupt as then,
Nor guiltless of corrupting other men,

But versed in arts, that, while they seem to stay
A falling empire, hasten its decay.
To the fair haven of my native home,
The wreck of what I was, fatigued I come ;
For once I can approve the patriot's voice,
And make the course he recommends my choice:
We meet at last in one sincere desire,

His wish and mine both prompt me to retire.

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Ask not the boy, who, when the breeze of morn First shakes the glittering drops from every thorn, Unfolds his flock, then under bank or bush Sits linking cherry-stones, or platting rush, How fair is freedom?- he was always free : To carve his rustic name upon a tree, To snare the mole, or with ill-fashioned hook To draw th' incautious minnow from the brook, Are life's prime pleasures in his simple view, His flock the chief concern he ever knew; She shines but little in his heedless eyes, The good we never miss we rarely prize : But ask the noble drudge in state affairs, Escaped from office and its constant cares, What charms he sees in freedom's smile expressed, In freedom lost so long, now repossessed; The tongue, whose strains were cogent as commands, Revered at home, and felt in foreign lands, Shall own itself a stammerer in that cause, Or plead its silence as its best applause.

THE STATE DRUDGE'S RELISH OF NATURE AND THE COUNTRY. -HEDGE-ROWS. MEADS. DOWNS. THE SEA-BOY.

He knows indeed that, whether dressed or rude, Wild without art, or artfully subdued, Nature in every form inspires delight, But never marked her with so just a sight.

Her hedgerow shrubs, a variegated store,
With woodbine and wild roses mantled o'er,
Green balks and furrowed lands, the stream, that
Its cooling vapor o'er the dewy meads, [spreads
Downs, that almost escape th' inquiring eye,
That melt and fade into the distant sky,
Beauties he lately slighted as he passed,
Seem all created since he travelled last.
Master of all th' enjoyments he designed,
No rough annoyance rankling in his mind,
What early philosophic hours he keeps,
How regular his meals, how sound he sleeps!
Not sounder he, that on the mainmast head,
While morning kindles with a windy red,
Begins a long look-out for distant land,
Nor quits till evening watch his giddy stand,
Then swift descending, with a seaman's haste,
Slips to his hammock, and forgets the blast.

RURAL COMPANIONS OF THE RETIRED STATESMAN. THE
MECHANIC.

He chooses company, but not the squire's, Whose wit is rudeness, whose good-breeding tires; Nor yet the parson's, who would gladly come, Obsequious when abroad, though proud at home; Nor can he much affect the neighboring peer, Whose toe of emulation treads too near ; But wisely seeks a more convenient friend, With whom, dismissing forms, he may unbend! A man, whom marks of condescending grace Teach, while they flatter him, his proper place; Who comes when called, and at a word withdraws, Speaks with reserve, and listens with applause ; Some plain mechanic, who, without pretence To birth or wit, nor gives nor takes offence; On whom he rests well pleased his weary powers, And talks and laughs away his vacant hours. The tide of life, swift always in its course, May run in cities with a brisker force, But nowhere with a current so serene, Or half so clear, as in the rural scene.

AMBITION RETURNS FROM RURAL DELIGHTS TO ITS TREADMILL
OF PATRIOTIC CARES.

Yet how fallacious is all earthly bliss!
What obvious truths the wisest heads may miss!
Some pleasures live a month, and some a year,
But short the date of all we gather here;
No happiness is felt, except the true,
That does not charm the more for being new.
This observation as it chanced, not made,
Or if the thought occurred, not duly weighed,
He sighs for after all by slow degrees
The spot he loved has lost the power to please;
To cross his ambling pony day by day,
Seems at the best but dreaming life away;
The prospect, such as might enchant despair,
He views it not, or sees no beauty there;
With aching heart, and discontented looks,
Returns at noon to billiards or to books,
But feels, while grasping at his faded joys,
A secret thirst of his renounced employs.

He chides the tardiness of every post,
Pants to be told of battles won or lost,
Blames his own indolence, observes, though late,
"T is criminal to leave a sinking state,
Flies to the levee, and, received with grace,
Kneels, kisses hands, and shines again in place.

SUBURBAN RESIDENCES SATIRIZED.

Suburban villas, highway-side retreats,
That dread th' encroachment of our growing streets,
Tight boxes neatly sashed, and in a blaze
With all a July sun's collected rays,
Delight the citizen, who, gasping there,

Breathes clouds of dust, and calls it country air.
O sweet retirement, who would balk the thought,
That could afford retirement, or could not?
"Tis such an easy walk, so smooth and straight,
The second milestone fronts the garden gate;
A step if fair, and if a shower approach,
You find safe shelter in the next stage-coach.
There, prisoned in a parlor snug and small,
Like bottled wasps upon a southern wall,

The man of business and his friends, compressed,
Forget their labors, and yet find no rest;
But still 't is rural trees are to be seen

From every window, and the fields are green;
Ducks paddle in the pond before the door,
And what could a remoter scene show more?

THE EDUCATED ALONE REQUIRE, OR CAN COMMAND, ELEGANT
AND APPROPRIATE RETREATS.

A sense of elegance we rarely find

The portion of a mean or vulgar mind;
And ignorance of better things makes man,
Who cannot much, rejoice in what he can ;
And he that deems his leisure well bestowed,
In contemplation of a turnpike road,
Is occupied as well, employs his hours
As wisely, and as much improves his powers,
As he that slumbers in pavilions graced
With all the charms of an accomplished taste.
Yet hence, alas! insolvencies; and hence
Th' unpitied victim of ill-judged expense,
From all his wearisome engagements freed,
Shakes hands with business, and retires indeed.

FASHIONABLE MIGRATION TO THE SEA-SHORE.

Your prudent grandmammas, ye modern belles, Content with Bristol, Bath, and Tunbridge-wells, When health required it would consent to roam, Else more attached to pleasures found at home. But now alike, gay widow, virgin, wife, Ingenious to diversify dull life,

In coaches, chaises, caravans, and hoys,
Fly to the coast for daily, nightly joys,
And all, impatient of dry land, agree
With one consent to rush into the sea.-

THE OCEAN.ITS SMILES AND ITS TERRORS.

Ocean exhibits, fathomless and broad,
Much of the power and majesty of God.
He swathes about the swelling of the deep,
That shines and rests as infants smile and sleep;
Vast as it is, it answers as it flows

The breathings of the lightest air that blows;
Curling and whitening over all the waste,
The rising waves obey th' increasing blast,
Abrupt and horrid, as the tempest roars,
Thunder and flash upon the stedfast shores,
Till He, that rides the whirlwind, checks the rein,
Then all the world of waters sleeps again.
Nereids or Dryads, as the fashion leads,
Now in the floods, now panting in the meads,
Votaries of Pleasure still, where'er she dwells,
Near barren rocks, in palaces, or cells,
O grant a poet leave to recommend

(A poet fond of nature, and your friend)
Her slighted works to your admiring view;
Her works must needs excel, who fashioned you.

CONTEMPLATION OF NATURE RECOMMENDED TO THE FRIVO

LOUS.

Would ye, when rambling in your morning ride, With some unmeaning coxcomb at your side, Condemn the prattler for his idle pains,

To waste unheard the music of his strains,
And, deaf to all th' impertinence of tongue,
That, while it courts, affronts and does you wrong,
Mark well the finished plan without a fault,
The seas globose and huge, th' o'er-arching vault,
Earth's millions daily fed, a world employed

In gathering plenty yet to be enjoyed,
Till gratitude grew vocal in the praise
Of God, beneficent in all his ways;

Graced with such wisdom, how would beauty shine!
Ye want but that to seem indeed divine.

THE SPENDTHRIFT'S DISGUST IN THE COUNTRY HE IS OBLIGED TO SEEK EXCEPT IN BOOKS.

Anticipated rents, and bills unpaid, Force many a shining youth into the shade, Not to redeem his time, but his estate, And play the fool, but at a cheaper rate. There, hid in loathed obscurity, removed From pleasures left, but never more beloved, He just endures, and with a sickly spleen Sighs o'er the beauties of the charming scene. Nature indeed looks prettily in rhyme ; Streams tinkle sweetly in poetic chime : The warblings of the blackbird, clear and strong, Are musical enough in Thomson's song; And Cobham's groves, and Windsor's green retreats, When Pope describes them, have a thousand sweets; He likes the country, but in truth must own, Most likes it, when he studies it in town.

GOOD-NATURED WILD JACK IMPOVERISHED.

Poor Jack -no matter who- for when I blame I pity, and must therefore sink the name, Lived in his saddle, loved the chase, the course, And always, ere he mounted, kissed his horse. Th' estate, his sires had owned in ancient years, Was quickly distanced, matched against a peer's. Jack vanished, was regretted and forgot; "T is wild good-nature's never-failing lot. At length, when all had long supposed him dead, By cold submersion, razor, rope, or lead,

My lord, alighting at his usual place,
The Crown, took notice of an ostler's face.
Jack knew his friend, but hoped in that disguise
He might escape the most observing eyes,
And whistling, as if unconcerned and gay,
Curried his nag, and looked another way.
Convinced at last, upon a nearer view,

'T was he, the same, the very Jack he knew ;
O'erwhelmed at once with wonder, grief, and joy,
He pressed him much to quit his base employ;
His countenance, his purse, his heart, his hand,
Influence and power, were all at his command:
Peers are not always generous as well-bred,
But Granby was, meant truly what he said. [strange,
Jack bowed, and was obliged, confessed 't was
That so retired he should not wish a change,
But knew no medium between guzzling beer
And his old stint-three thousand pounds a year.

MOTIVES FOR RETIREMENT.

Thus some retire to nourish hopeless woe;
Some seeking happiness not found below;
Some to comply with humor, and a mind
To social scenes by nature disinclined;
Some swayed by fashion, some by deep disgust;
Some self-impoverished, and because they must;
But few, that court retirement, are aware
Of half the toils they must encounter there.
Lucrative offices are seldom lost

For want of powers proportioned to the post :
Give even a dunce the employment he desires,
And he soon finds the talents it requires;
A business with an income at its heels
Furnishes always oil for its own wheels.
But in his arduous enterprise to close
His active years with indolent repose,
He finds the labors of that state exceed
His utmost faculties, severe indeed!

LEISURE DIFFICULT TO MANAGE. THOUGHT AND REVERY.

"T is easy to resign a toilsome place,
But not to manage leisure with a grace;
Absence of occupation is not rest,
A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed.
The veteran steed, excused his task at length,
In kind compassion of his failing strength,
And turned into the park or mead to graze,
Exempt from future service all his days,
There feels a pleasure perfect in its kind,
Ranges at liberty, and snuffs the wind:
But when his lord would quit the busy road,
To taste a joy like that he had bestowed,
He proves, less happy than his favored brute,
A life of ease a difficult pursuit.

Thought, to the man that never thinks, may seem
As natural as when asleep to dream;
But reveries (for human minds will act)
Specious in show, impossible in fact,

Those flimsy webs, that break as soon as wrought,
Attain not to the dignity of thought:
Nor yet the swarms, that occupy the brain,
Where dreams of dress, intrigue, and pleasure, reign;

Nor such as useless conversation breeds, Or lust engenders, and indulgence feeds.

THOUGHTS OF THE FUTURE.

Whence, and what are we? to what end ordained?
What means the drama by the world sustained?
Business or vain amusement, care or mirth,
Divide the frail inhabitants of earth.

Is duty a mere sport, or an employ?
Life an intrusted talent, or a toy?

Is there, as reason, conscience, Scripture, say,
Cause to provide for a great future day,
When, earth's assigned duration at an end,
Man shall be summoned, and the dead attend?
The trumpet-will it sound; the curtain rise,
And show the august tribunal of the skies;
Where no prevarication shall avail,
Where eloquence and artifice shall fail,
The pride of arrogant distinctions fall,
And conscience and our conduct judge us all?

THE LABORS OF THE LEARNED WEIGHED.

Pardon me, ye that give the midnight oil
To learned cares, or philosophic toil,
Though I revere your honorable names,
Your useful labors and important aims,
And hold the world indebted to your aid,
Enriched with the discoveries ye have made ;
Yet let me stand excused, if I esteem
A mind employed on so sublime a theme,
Pushing her bold inquiry to the date
And outline of the present transient state,
And, after poising her adventurous wings,
Settling at last upon eternal things,
Far more intelligent, and better taught
The strenuous use of profitable thought,
Than ye, when happiest, and enlightened most,
And highest in renown, can justly boast.

WHAT LITERATURE LEISURE NEEDS.

;

A mind unnerved, or indisposed to bear The weight of subjects worthiest of her care, Whatever hopes a change of scene inspires, Must change her nature, or in vain retires. An idler is a watch, that wants both hands As useless if it goes, as when it stands. Books therefore, not the scandal of the shelves, In which lewd sensualists print out themselves; Nor those in which the stage gives vice a blow, With what success let modern manners show; Nor his, who, for the bane of thousands born, Built God a church, and laughed his Word to scorn, Skilful alike to seem devout and just, And stab religion with a sly side-thrust; Nor those of learned philologists, who chase A panting syllable through time and space, Start it at home, and hunt it in the dark, To Gaul, to Greece, and into Noah's ark; But such as learning without false pretence, The friend of truth, the associate of sound sense, And such as, in the zeal of good design, Strong judgment laboring in the Scripture mine,

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