Still on thy solemn steps attend

Warm Charity the general friend,
With Justice to herself severe,

And Pity, dropping soft the sadly pleasing tear.

Oh! gently on thy suppliant's head,
Dread goddess lay thy chast'ning hand!
Not in thy Gorgon terrors clad,
Nor circled with the vengeful band!
(As by the impious thou art seen)

With thund'ring voice, and threat'ning mien,
With screaming horror's fun'ral cry,
Despair, and fell Disease, and ghastly Poverty,

Thy form benign, oh, Goddess! wear,
Thy milder influence impart,

Thy philosophic train be there

To soften, not to wound my heart.
The gen'rous spark, extinct, revive,
Teach me to love and to forgive;

Exact my own defects to scan "

What others are to feel, and know myself a man.

CHAP. I X.

GRAY,

Ode on a distant Prospect of Eton

༄།།

College.

Yz distant spires, ye antique towers, the wat'ry glade,

That crown the

Where grateful Science still adores
Her Henry's holy shade;

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And ye that from the stately brow
Of Windsor's heights th' expanse below

Of grove, of , of mead

Survey,

Whose turf, whose shade, whose flowers among

Wanders the hoary Thames along

His silver-winding way.

Ah happy hills, ah pleasing shade

Ah fields belov'd in vain

Where once my careless childhood stray'd,
A stranger yet to pain!

I feel the gales that from ye blow,
A momentary bliss bestow,

As waving fresh their gladsome wing,
My weary soul they seem to sooth,
And redolent of joy and youth,
To breathe a second spring.

Say, Father Thames (for thou hast seen
Full many a sprightly race,

Disporting on thy margent green,
The paths of pleasure trace)

Who foremost now delight to cleave
With pliant arm thy glassy wave?
The captive linnet which enthral ?
What idle progeny succeed

To chase the rolling circle's speed,
Or urge the Dying ball?

While some, on earnest business bent, Their murm'ring labours ply

'Gainst graver hours, that bring constraint To sweeten liberty:

Some bold adventurers disdain

The limits of their little reign,

And unknown regions dare descry:
Still as they run they look behind,
They hear a voice in every wind,
And snatch a fearful joy.

Gay hope is their's by fancy fed
Less pleasing when possest;
The tear forgot as soon as shed,
The sunshine of the breast;
Their's buxom health of rosy hue
Wild wit, invention ever new ?
And lively cheer of vigour born;
The thoughtless day, the easy night,
The spirits pure, the slumbers light,
That fly th' approach of morn.
Alas, regardless of their doom,

The little victims play!

No sense have they of ills to come
No care beyond to-day:

Yet see how all around them wait
The ministers of human fate,

And black Misfortune's baleful train!
Ah, shew them where in ambush stand
To seize their prey the murth'rous band!
Ah, tell them, they are men!

These shall the fury Passions tear
The vultures of the mind,
Disdainful Anger, pallid Fear,
And Shame that skulks behind;
Or pining Love shall waste their youth,
Or Jealousy with rankling tooth,
That inly knaws the secret heart,
And Envy wan, and faded Care,
Grim-visag'd comfortless Despair,
And Sorrow's piercing dart.

Ambition this shall tempt to rise
Then whirl the wretch from high,
To bitter Scorn a sacrifice

And grinning Infamy.

The stings of Falshood those shall try,
And hard Unkindness' alter'd eye,
That mocks the tear it forc'd to flow;
And keen Remorse with blood defil'd,
And moody Madness laughing wild
Amid severest woe.

Lo, in the vale of years beneath
A grisly troop are seen

The painful family of Death

More hideous than their queen:

This racks the joints, this fires the veins
That every labouring sinew strains,

Those in the deeper vitals

rage:

Lo, Poverty, to fill the band,

That numbs the soul with icy hand,
And slow-consuming Age.

To

To each his suff'rings: all are men, Condemn'd alike to groan;

The tender for another's pain,

Th' unfeeling for his own.

Yet ah! why should they know their fate?
Since sorrow never comes to late,
And happiness too swiftly flies:
Thought would destroy their paradise.
No more; where ignorance is bliss,
Tis folly to be wise.

CHA P. X.

GRAY.

Elegy written in a Country ChurchYard.

Tng curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea;
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds;
Save where the beetle wheels his drony flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;
Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r,
The mopeing owl does to the moon complain
Of such, as wand'ring near her secret bow'r,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn,
The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.
For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care:
No children run to lisp their sire's return,

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Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,

Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke:
How jocund did they drive their team a-field!
How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!
Let not ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile,
The short and simple annals of the poor.
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Await alike th' inevitable hour;

The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,
If Mem'ry o'er their tombs no trophies raise,
Where thro' the long-drawn isle, and fretted vault,
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.
Can storied urn, or animated bust,

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath;
Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or flatt'ry sooth the dull cold ear of Death?
Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid
Some heart once prenant with celestial fire,
Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway'd,
Or wak'd to ecstacy the living lyre.

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page,
Rich with the spoils of Time did ne'er unroll;
Chill Penury repress'd their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene

The dark unfathom'd caves of Ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast
The little Tyrant of his fields withstood;
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.