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Pow'r of the foft and rofy face!
The vivid pulfe, the vermil grace,
The fpirits, when they gayeft fhine,
Youth, beauty, pleafure, all are thine!
O fun of life! whofe heav'nly ray
Lights up and cheers our various day,
The turbulence of hopes and fears,
The ftorm of fate, the cloud of years,
Till nature, with thy parting light,
Repofes late in Death's calm night:
Fled from the trophy'd roofs of state,
Abodes of fplendid pain and hate;

Fled from the couch, where, in fweet fleep,
Hot Riot would his anguish fteep,
But tolles thro' the midnight shade,
Of death, of life, alike afraid;
For ever fled to fhady cell,

Where Temp'rance, where the Mules dwell;
Thou oft art feen, at early dawn,
Slow-pacing o'er the breezy lawn:
Or on the brow of mountain high,
In filence feafting ear and eye,
With fong and profpect which abound
From birds, and woods, and waters round.
But when the fun, with noon-tide ray,
Flames forth intolerable day;
While Heat fits fervent on the plain,
With Thirst and Languor in his train
(All nature fick'ning in the blaze)
Thou, in the wild and woody maze
That clouds the vale with umbrage deep,
Impendent from the neighb'ring steep,
Wilt find betimes a calm retrcat,
Where breathing Coolness has her feat.
There, plung'd amid the fhadows brown,
Imagination lays him down;
Attentive, in his airy mood,
To ev'ry murmur of the wood:
The bee in yonder flow'ry nook,
The chidings of the headlong brook,
The green leaf quiv'ring in the gale,
The warbling hill, the lowing vale,
The diftant woodman's echoing stroke,
The thunder of the falling oak.
From thought to thought in vifion led,
He holds high converfe with the dead;
Sages or poets. See, they rife!
And fhadowy skim before his eyes.
Hark! Orpheus ftrikes the lyre again,
That foften'd favages to men:
Lo! Socrates, the Sent of Heav'n,
To whom its moral will was giv’n.
Fathers and Friends of human kind!
They form'd the nations, or refin'd,
With all that mends the head and heart,
Enlight'ning truth, adorning art.

Thus muling in the folemn fhade,
At once the founding biceze was laid:
And nature, by the unknown law,
Shook deep with reverential awe;
Dumb filence grew upon the hour;
A browner night involv'd the bow'r:
When, iffuing from the inmost wood,
Appear'd fair Freedom's Genius good.

O Freedom! fov'reign boon of Heav'n :
Great Charter with our being giv'n;
For which the patriot and the fage
Have plann'd, have bled thro' ev'ry age!
High privilege of human race,
Beyond a mortal monarch's grace:
Who could not give, who cannot claim,
What but from God inmediate came!

§ 126. Ode to Evening. Dr. Jos. WARTON. HAIL, meek-ey'd maiden, clad in fober grey, Whofe foft approach the weary wood-man loves;

As homeward bent, to kifs his prattling babes,
Jocund, he whiftles thro' the twilight groves.
When Phoebus finks behind the gilded hills,
You lightly o'er the mifty meadows walk,
The drooping daifies bathe in dulcet dews,
And nurfe the nodding violet's tender stalk.
The panting Dryads, that in day's fierce heat,
To inmuft bow'rs and cooling caverns ran,
Return to trip in wanton ev'ning dance;
Old Sylvan too returns, and laughing Pan.
To the deep wood the clam'rous rooks repair,
Light fkims the fwallow o'er the wat'ry fcene;
And from the theep-cote and fresh furrow'd field,
Stout plowmen meet to wrestle on the green.
The fwain that artlefs fings on yonder rock,
His fupping theep and length'ning fhadow fpies,
Pleas'd with the cool, the calm refreshing hour,
And with hoarfe humming of unnumber'd flies.
Now ev'ry paffion fleeps: defponding Love,
And pining Envy, ever-reftlefs Pride;
And holy Calm creeps o'er my peaceful foul,
Anger and mad Ambition's ftorms fubfide.
O modeft Evening! oft let me appear
A wand'ring vot'ry in thy penfive train;
Lift'ning to ev'ry wildly-warbling note
That fills with farewell (weet thy dark'ning plain,

§ 127. Epiftolary Verfes to George Colman, Efq. written in the Year 1756.

ROBERT LLOYD.

You know, dear George, I'm none of those
That condefcend to write in profe:
Infpir'd with pathos and fublime,
I always foar-in doggrel rhyme,
And fearce can ask you how you do,
Without a jingling rhyme or two.
Befides, I always took delight in
What bears the name of eafy writing:
Perhaps the reafon makes it please
Is, that I find its writ with ease.

I vent a notion here in private,
Which public tafte can ne'er connive at,
Which thinks no wit or judgment greater
Than Addifon and his Spectator;

Who

Who fays (it is no matter where,
But that he fays it I can fwear)
With eafy verfe moft bards are finitten,
Because they think 'tis eafy written;
Whereas the easier it appears,
The greater marks of care it wears;
Of which, to give an explanation,
Take this by way of illuftration:
The fam'd Mat. Prior, it is faid,
Oft bit his nails and fcratch'd his head,
And chang'd a thought a hundred times,
Because he did not like the rhymes:
To make my meaning clear, and please ye,
In fhort, he labour'd to write easy;
And yet, no Critic e'er defines
His poems into labour'd lines.
I have a fimile will hit him;

His verfe, like clothes, was made to fit him,
Which (as no taylor e'er deny'd)
The better fit the more they're try'd.

Tho' I have mention'd Prior's name,
Think not I aim at Prior's fame:
'Tis the refult of admiration,

To spend itself in imitation;
If imitation may be faid,
Which is in me by nature bred,

And you have better proofs than these,
That I'm idolater of Ease.

Who but a madman would engage
A Poet in the prefent age?

Write what we will, our works befpeak us,
Imitatores, fervum pecus.
Tale, Elegy, or lofty Ode,
We travel in the beaten road,

The proverb ftill fticks closely by us,
Nil dictum, quod non dictum prius.
The only comfort that I know
Is, that 'twas faid an age ago,
Ere Milton foar'd in thought fublime,
Ere Pope refin'd the chink of rhyme,
Ere Coleman wrote in ftyle fo pure,
Or the great Two the Connoiffeur;
Ere I burlefqu'd the rural cit,
Proud to hedge in my fcraps of wit,
And happy in the close connection,
T'acquire fome name from their reflection;
So (the fimilitude is trite)

The moon ftill fhines with borrow'd light,
And, like the race of modern beaux,
Ticks with the fun for her lac'd clothes.

Methinks, there is no better time
To fhew the ufc I make of rhyme
Than now, when I, who, from beginning,
Was always fond of couplet-finning,
Prefuming on good-nature's fcore,
Thus lay my bantling at your door.
The first advantage which I fee
Is, that I ramble loofe and free:

The bard indeed full oft complains,
That rhymes are fetters, links, and chains;
And, when he wants to leap the fence,
Still keeps him pris'ner to the sense.
Howe'er in common-place he rage,
Rhyme's like your fetters on the stage,
Which when the player once hath wore,
It makes him only ftrut the more,
While, raving in pathetic ftrains,
He fhakes his legs to clank his chains.
From rhyme, as from a handfome face,
Nonfenfe acquires a kind of grace;
I therefore give it all its scope,
That fenfe may unperceiv'd elope:
So Mrs of bafeft tricks
(I love a fling at politics)
Amuse the nation, court, and king,
With breaking F-kes, and hanging Byng;
And make each puny rogue a prey,
While they, the greater, flink away.
This fimile perhaps would strike,
If match'd with fomething more alike;
Then take it, drefs'd a fecond time,
In Prior's Ease, and my Sublime.
Say, did you never chance to meet
A mob of people in the street,
Ready to give the robb'd relief,
And all in hafte to catch a thief,
While the fly rogue, who filch'd the prey,
Too close befet to run away,

Stop thief! ftop thief! exclaims aloud,
And fo efcapes among the crowd?
So Minifters, &c.

O England, how I mourn thy fate!
For fure thy loffes now are great;
Two fuch what Briton can endure,
Minorca and the Connoiffeur !

To-day, or ere the fun goes down,
Will die the Cenfor, Mr. Town!
He dies, whoe'er takes pains to con him,
With blufhing honours thick upon him;
O may his name thefe verfes fave,
Be thefe infcrib'd upon his grave!

Know, Reader, that on Thursday dy'd The Connoiffeur, a Suicide! 'Yet think not that his foul is fled, Nor rank him 'mongst the vulgar dead; Howe'er defun&t you fet him down, 'He's only going out of Town.'

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September 30th, 1756, when Mr. Town, author of the Connoiffeur, a periodical Effay (fince published in four volumes, printed for R. Baldwin, London) took leave of his readers with an humorous account of himself.

This elegant Poem was written by a gentleman well known in the learned world, as a token of gratiRude for favours conferred on his father during the last war, whofe character he has therein affumed.

And

And meafures forth, with unwithdrawing hand, J How headlong Rhone and Ebro, erst disdain'd The bleffings of the various year, With Moorish carnage, quakes through all her Sunshine or fhow'r, and chides the madding

tempeft.

With her the heav'n-bred nymph meck Charity, Shall fashion Onflow forth in faireft portrait;

And with recording care [claims. Weave the fresh wreath that flow'ring Virtue But oh, what Mufe fhall join the band? He long has fojourn'd in the facred haunts, And knows each whifp'ring grot and glade

Trod by Apollo and the light-foot Graces.

How then fhall aukward gratitude And the prefumption of untutor'd duty

Attune my numbers, all too rude? Little he recks the meed of fuch a fong; Yet will I ftretch aloof,

And when I tell of Courtefy,

Of well attemper'd Zeal,

Of awful Prudence foothing fell Contention,
Where fhall the lineaments agree

But in thee, Onflow? You your wonted leave Indulge me, nor mifdeen a foldier's bold emprize;

Who in the diffonance of barb'rous war,
Long-train'd, revifits oft the facred treasures
Of antique memory;

Or where fage Pindar reins his fiery car,
Thro' the vaft vaults of heav'n, fecure;
Or what the Attic Mufe that Homer fill'd,
Her other fon, thy Milton, taught;
Or range the flow'ry fields of gentle Spenfer.

And ever as I go, allurements vain
Cherifh a feeble fire, and feed my idle
Fancy: O could I once

Charm to their melody my fhrilling reeds!
To Henries and to Edwards old,

Dread names! I'd meditate the faithful fong;

Or tell what time Britannia,
Whilom the fairest daughter of old Ocean,
In loathly difarray, duil eyes,
And faded cheek, wept o'er her abject sons:
Till William, great deliverer,

Led on the comely train, gay Liberty,
Religion, matron ftaid,

With all her kindred goddeffes;
Juftice with fteady brow,

Trim Plenty, laureat Peace, and green-hair'd
Commerce,

In flowing veft of thoufand hues. Fain would I fhadow out old Bourbon's pile, Tott'ring with doubtful weight, and threat'ning cumb'rous fall;

Or trace our navy, where in tow'ring pride O'er the wide-fwelling wafte it rolls avengeful. As when collected clouds

Forth from the gloomy fouth in deep array, Athwart the dark'ning landfcape throng, Fraught with loud ftorm's, and thunder's dreadful peal,

At which the murd’rer stands aghaft, And wafting Riot ill diffembles terror.

branches

Soon fhall I greet the morn, [name When Europe fav'd, Britain and George's Shall found o'er Flandria's level field, Familiar in domestic merriment;

Be carol'd loud adown the echoing Danube.
Or by the jolly mariner

The juft memorial of fair deeds
Still flourishes, and, like th'untainted foul,
Bloffoms in fresheft age, above

The weary flesh, and Envy's rankling wound,
Such after years mature

In full account fhall be thy meed.
O! may your rifing hope

Well principled in ev'ry virtue bloom!
Till a fresh-fpringing ftock implore
With infant hands a grandfire's pow'rful
[fports purfue.
Or round your honour'd couch their prattling

pray'r,

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Or wand'ring wild thro' Chili's boundless shade. Say, rove thy fteps o'er Lybia's naked waste ? Or feck fome diftant folitary fhore?

Or on the Andes' topmoft mountain plac'd,
Do'ft fit, and hear the folemn thunder roar?
Fix'd on fome hanging rock's projected brow,

Hear'ft thou low murmurs from the distant dome?
Or ftray thy feet where pale dejected Woe
Pours her long wail from fome lamented tomb?
Hark! yon deep echo strikes the trembling ear!
See night's dun curtain wraps the dark fome pole!
O'er heav'n's blue arch yon rolling worlds ap-.

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Short is Ambition's gay deceitful dream; Though wreaths of blooming laurel bind her brow,

Calm thought difpels the vifionary scheme, And Time's cold breath diffolves the withering bough.

Sleeps it more fweetly than the fimple swain,
Beneath fome moffy turf that refts his head?
Where the lone widow tells the night her pain,
And eve with dewy tears embalms the dead.
The lily, fcreen'd from ev'ry ruder gale,
Courts not the cultur'd fpot where rofes fpring:
But blows neglected in the peaceful vale,
And scents the zephyr's balmy breathing wing.
The bufts of grandeur and the pomp of pow'r,
Can thefe bid Sorrow's gufhing tears fubfide›
Can these avail, in that tremendous hour, [tide!

Slow as fome miner faps th'afpiring tow'r,
When working fecret with deftructive aim;
Unfeen, unheard, thus moves the stealing hour,
But works the fall of empire, pomp, and name.
Then let thy pencil mark the traits of man;
Full in the draught be keen-ey'd Hope pour-When Death's cold hand congeals the purple

tray'd:

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Whets her fell fting, and points it at the heart.
Perch'd like a raven on fome blafted yew,
Let Guilt revolve the thought diftracting fin;
Scar'd-while her eyes furvey th'ethereal blue
Left Heav'n's ftrong lightning burft the dark
within.

Then paint, impending o'er the madd'ning deep, That rock, where heart-struck Sappho, vainly brave,

Stood firm of foul;-then from the dizzy fteep
Impetuous fprung, and dafh'd the boiling wave.
Here, wrapt in ftudious thought, let Fancy rove,
Still prompt to mark Sufpicion's fecret fnare;
To fee where Anguish nips the bloom of Love,
Or trace proud Grandeur to the domes of Care.
Should e'er Ambition's tow'ring hopes inflame,
Let judging Reason draw the veil afide;
Or, fir'd with envy at fome mighty name,
Read o'er the monument that tells-He dy'd.
What are the enfigns of imperial fway?
What all that Fortune's lib'ral hand
brought?

has

Teach they the voice to pour a fweeter lay?
Or roufe the foul to more exalted thought?
When bleeds the heart as Genius blooms un-
known?

When melts the eve o'er Virtue's mournful bier?
Not Wealth, but Pity, fwells the buifting groan,
Not Pow'r, but whifp'ring Nature, prompts the

tear.

Say, gentle mourner, in yon mouldy vault, Where the worm fattens on fome fcepter'd brow, Beneath that roof with fculptur'd marble fraught, Why fleeps unmov'd the breathlefs dust below?

bloom,

Ah no! the mighty names are heard no more:
Pride's thought fublime, and Beauty's kindling
Serve but to fport one flying moment o'er,
And fwell with pompuous verfe the fcutcheon'd
tomb.

For me my Paffion ne'er my foul invade,
Nor be the whims of tow'ring Frenzy giv'n;
Let Wealth ne'er court me from the peaceful
fhade,

Where Contemplation wings the foul to Heav'n!

O guard me fafe from Joy's enticing fnare!
With each extreme that Pleasure tries to hide,
The poifon'd breath of flow-confuming Care,
The noife of Folly, and the dreams of Pride.
But oft, when midnight's fadly folemn knell
Sounds long and diftant from the fky-topp'd tow'r,
Or walk with Milton thro' the dark obfcure.
Calm let me fit in Profper's lonely cell*,
Thus, when the tranfient dream of life is filed,
Mav fome fad friend recall the former years;
Then ftretch'd in filence o'er my dufty bed,
Pour the warm gufh of fympathetic tears!

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Sits on yon hoary tow'r with ivy crown'd,
Or wildly wails o'er thy lamented tomb;
Hear'ft thou the folemn mufic wind along?
Or thrills the warbling note in thy mellifluous
fong i

See Shakespeare's Tempeft.

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I. 2.

Oft, while on earth, 'twas thine to rove
Where'er the wild-ey'd goddefs lov'd to roam,
To trace, ferene, the gloomy grove,
Or haunt meek Quiet's fimple dome;
Still hov'ring round the Nine appear,
That pour the foul transporting ftrain;
Join'd to the Loves gay train,

The loofe-rob'd Graces crown'd with flow'rs,
The light-wing'd gales that lead the vernal year,
And wake the rofy-featur'd hours.

O'er all bright Fancy's beamy radiance fhone,
How flam'd thy bolom as her charms reveal!
Her fire-clad eye fublime, her starry zone,
Her treffes loofe that wanton'd on the gale,
On thee the goddefs fix'd her ardent look,
Then from her glowing lips thefe melting ac-
cents broke:

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II. z.

The pale-ey'd genius of the shade
Led thy bold ftep to Profper's magic bow'r,
Whofe voice the howling winds obey'd,
Whofe dark fpell chain'd the rapid hour;
Then rofe fercne the fea-girt ifle,
Gay fcenes, by Fancy's touch refin'd,
Glow'd to the musing mind:

Say, whence the magic of thy mind ›
Why thrills thy mufic on the fprings of thought
Why, at thy pencil's touch refin'd,
Starts into life the glowing draught?
On yonder fairy carpet laid,
Where beauty pours eternal bloom,
And zephyr breathes perfume;
There, nightly, to the tranced eye
Profufe the radiant Goddess itood display'd,
With all her fmiling offspring nigh.
Sudden, the mantling cliff, the arching wood,
The broider'd mead, the landfkip, and the grove,
Hills, vales, and fky-dipt feas, and torrents rude,
Grots, rills, and fhades, and bow'rs that breath'd;
of love,

All burt to fight! while glancing on the view, Titania's fporting train brath'd lightly o'er the dew.

Such vifions blefs the hermit's dream,
When hov'ring angels prompt his placid smile,
Or paint fome high ecftatic theme.
Then flam'd Miranda on th'enraptur'd gaze,
Then fail'd bright Ariel on the bat's fleet wing;
Or ftarts the lift'ning throng in still amaze!
The wild note trembling on th'aerial ftring!
The form, in Heav'n's refplendent vesture gay,
Floats on the mantling cloud, and pours the
melting lay.

II. 3.

O lay me near yon limpid ftream,
Whole murmur foothes the ear of woe t
There, in fome fweet poetic dream,
Let Fancy's bright Elyfium glow!
'Tis done;o'er all the blufhing mead
The dark wood shakes his cloudy head;
Below, the lily-fringed dale

Breathes its mild fragrance on the gale;
While in paftime, all-unfeen,
Titania, rob'd in mantle green,
Sports on the moffy bank; her train
Skims light along the gleaming plain,
Or to the flutt'ring breeze unfold
The blue wing ftreak'd with beamy gold,
Its pinions op'ning to the light!
Say, burfts the vifion on my fight?
Ah no! by Shakespear's pencil drawn,
The beauteous fhapes appear,
While meck-ey'd Cynthia near [lawn t
Illumnes with ftreamy ray the filver-mantled

III. 1.

But hark! the tempeft howls afar !
Burfts the wide whirlwind o'er the pathlefs waste!
What cherub blows the trump of war?
What demon rides the stormy blast?
Red from the lightning's livid blaze,
The bleak heath rufhes on the fight,
Then, wrapt in fudden night,
Diffolves. But ah: what kingly form
Roams the lone defart's defolated maze t,
Unaw'd! nor heeds the fweeping storm.
Ye pale-ey'd lightnings fpare the cheek of age!
Vain with! tho' anguish heaves the bursting

groan,

Deaf as the flint, the marble ear of rage Hears not the mourner's unavailing moan: Heart-pierc'd he bleeds, and, ftung with wild defpair, [hair! Bares his time-blafted head, and tears his filver Ariel; fee the Tempeft. S.e the Midfummer Night's Dream.

Venus.

+ Lear.

Lo!

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