In weakness fafe, the fex I fee
With idle luftre shine;
For what are all their joys to me,
Which cannot now be mine?
But hold-I feel my gout decrease,
My troubles laid to rest,
And truths which would disturb my peace.
Are painful truths at best.
Vainly the time I have to roll
In fad reflection flies;
Ye fondling paffions of my foul!
Ye fweet deceits! arife.
I wifely change the scene within,
To things that us'd to please;
In pain, philosophy is spleen,
In health, 'tis only ease.
the blue taper's trembling light,
No more I waste the wakeful night,
Intent with endless view to pore
The schoolmen and the fages o'er:
Their books from wifdom widely ftray,
Or point at best the longest way.
I'll feek a readier path, and go
Where wisdom's furely taught below.
How deep yon azure dyes the sky!
Where orbs of gold unnumber'd lie,
While through their ranks in filver pride
The nether crescent seems to glide.
The flumbering breeze forgets to breathe,
The lake is fmooth and clear beneath,
Where once again the spangled show
Defcends to meet our eyes below.
The grounds, which on the right aspire,
In dimnefs from the view retire:
The left prefents a place of graves,
Whofe wall the filent water laves.
That steeple guides thy doubtful fight
Among the livid gleams of night.
There pafs with melancholy state
By all the folemn heaps of fate,
And think, as foftly-fad you tread
Above the venerable dead,
Time was, like thee, they life poffeft,
And time fhall be, that thou shalt rest.
Those with bending ofier bound,
That nameless heave the crumbled ground,
Quick to the glancing thought disclose,
Where toil and poverty repofe.
The flat fmooth ftones that bear a name,
The chiffel's flender help to fame
(Which ere our set of friends decay
Their frequent fteps may wear away) ;
A middle race of mortals own,
Men, half ambitious, all unknown.
The marble tombs that rise on high,
Whofe dead in vaulted arches lie,
Whose pillars fwell with sculptur'd ftones,
Arms, angels, epitaphs, and bones,
Thefe, all the poor remains of state,
Adorn the rich, or praise the great;
Who, while on earth in fame they live,
Are senseless of the fame they give.
Ha! while I gaze, pale Cynthia fades,
The bursting earth unveils the fhades!
All flow, and wan, and wrap'd with fhrouds,
They rife in vifionary crowds,
And all with fober accent cry,
Think, mortal, what it is to die.
Now from yon black and funeral yew, That bathes the charnel-house with dew, Methinks, I hear a voice begin;
(Ye ravens, cease your croaking din,
Ye tolling clocks, no time refound
O'er the long lake and midnight ground!)
It fends a peal of hollow groans,
Thus speaking from among the bones.
When men my scythe and darts fupply,
How great a King of Fears am I!
They view me like the laft of things;
They make, and then they draw, my ftrings.
Fools! if you lefs provok'd your fears,
No more my spectre-form appears.
Death's but a path that must be trod,
If man would ever pass to God:
A port of calms, a ftate to ease
From the rough rage of fwelling feas.
Why then thy flowing fable ftoles,
Deep pendant cyprefs, mourning poles,
Loofe fcarfs to fall athwart thy weeds,
Long palls, drawn hearses, cover'd steeds,
And plumes of black, that, as they tread,
Nod o'er the 'fcutcheons of the dead?
Nor can the parted body know,
Nor wants the foul, thefe forms of woe;
As men who long in prifon dwell,
With lamps that glimmer round the cell,
Whene'er their suffering years are run,
Spring forth to greet the glittering fun :
Such joy, though far tranfcending sense,
Have pious fouls at parting hence.
On earth, and in the body plac'd,
A few, and evil years, they waste :
But when their chains are cast afide,
See the glad fcene unfolding wide,
Clap the glad wing, and tower away,
And mingle with the blaze of day.
LOVELY, lafting peace of mind!
Sweet delight of human kind! Heavenly born, and bred on high, To crown the favorites of the sky
With more of happiness below,
Than victors in a triumph know!
Whither, O whither art thou fled,
To lay thy meek contented head;
What happy region doft thou please
To make the feat of calms and ease!
Ambition fearches all its sphere
Of pomp and state, to meet thee there.
Encreasing avarice would find
Thy prefence in its gold infhrin'd.
The bold adventurer ploughs his way,
Through rocks amidst the foaming sea,
To gain thy love; and then perceives
Thou wert not in the rocks and waves.
The filent heart, which grief affails,
Treads foft and lonesome o'er the vales,
Sees daifies open, rivers run,
And feeks (as I have vainly done)
Amufing thought; but learns to know
That Solitude's the nurse of woe.
No real happiness is found
In trailing purple o'er the ground:
Or in a foul exalted high,
Το range the circuit of the sky,
Converse with stars above, and know
All Nature in its forms below;
The reft it feeks, in feeking dies,
And doubts at laft for knowledge rife.
Lovely, lafting peace, appear!
This world itself, if thou art here,
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