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Or turn to nobler, greater tasks thy care,
To me thy sympathetic gifts impart;
Teach me in Friendship's griefs to bear a share,
And justly boast the generous feeling heart.
Teach me to sooth the helpless orphan's grief,
With timely aid the widow's woe assuage,
To Misery's moving cries to yield relief,
And be the sure resource of drooping age.
So when the genial spring of life shall fade,
And sinking nature owns the dread decay,
Some soul congenial then may lend its aid,
And gild the close of life's exentful day,

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Dim in my breast life's dying taper burns,
And all the joys of life with health are flown.
Starting and shiv'ring in th' inconstant wind,
Meagre and pale, the ghost of what I was,
Beneath some blasted tree I lie reclin'd,
And count the silent moments as they pass:
The winged moments, whose unstaying speed
No art can stop, or in their course arrest;
Whose flight shall shortly count me with the
dead,
[rest.
And lay me down in peace with them that
Oft morning dreams presage approaching fate;
And morning dreams, as poets tell, are true:
Led by pale ghosts, I enter death's dark gate,
And bid the realms of light and life adieu!
I hear the helpless wail, the shriek of woe;
I see the muddy wave, the dreary shore,
The sluggish streams that slowly creep below,
Which mortals visit, and return no more.
Farewel, ye blooming fields! ye cheerful plains!
Enough for me the churchyard's lonely
mound,

Where Melancholy with still Silence reigns,
And the rank grass waves o'er the cheerless
ground.

There let me wander at the close of eve,
When sleep sits dewy on the labourer's eyes,
The world and all its busy follies leave,
And talk with wisdom where my Daphnis

lies.

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When o'er the hill is shed a paler day,
That gives to stillness, and to night, the groves.
Ah! let the gay, the roseate morning hail,
When, in the various blooms of light array,
She bids fresh beauty live along the vale,
And rapture tremble in the vocal shade:
Sweet is the lucid morning's op'ning flow't,
Her choral melodies benignly rise;
Yet dearer to my soul the shadowy hour,
At which her blossoms close, her music de:
For then mild nature, while she droop he
Wakes the soft tear 'tis luxury to shed

§ 142. Sonnet to Expression. Miss WILLIAMS

EXPRESSION, child of soul! I love to trace
Thy strong enchantments, when the poe
lyre,

The painter's pencil, catch the vivid fire,
And beauty wakes for thee each touching gra
But from my frighted gaze thy form avert,
When horror chills thy tear, thy ardent sig
When phrensy rolls in thy impassion'd eye,
Or guilt lives fearful at thy troubled heart;
Nor ever let my shudd'ring fancy hear
The wasting groan, or view the pallid
Of him the Muses lov'd, when hope forsers
His spirit, vainly to the Muses dear [
For charm'd with heavenly song, this blee
Mourns it could sharpen ill, and give despa

rest!

look

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Chatterton.

But most for this, pale orb! thy light is dear,
For this, benignant orb! I hail thee most,
That while I pour the unavailing tear,
And mourn that hope to me, in youth is lost!
Thy light can visionary thoughts impart,
And lead the Muse to sooth a suff'ring heart.
SAVAGE.

$145. The Bastard.

IN gayer hours, when high my fancy ran,
The Muse, exulting, thus her lay began:

My Muse to grief resigns the varying tone,
The raptures languish, and the numbers
groan.

O Memory! thou soul of joy and pain!
Thou actor of our passions o'er again!
Why dost thou aggravate the wreich's woe?
Why add continuous smart to ev'ry blow?
Few are my joys; alas! how soon forgot!
On that kind quarter thou invad'st me not:
While sharp and numberless my sorrows fall;

Blest be the Bastard's birth! through won-Yet thou repeat'st and multipliest them all!

drous ways

He shines eccentric like a comet's blaze!
He lives to build, not boast, a generous race:
No tenth transmitter of a foolish face.
His daring hope no sire's example bounds;
His first-born lights no prejudice corrfounds.
He, kindling from within, requires no flame;
He glories in a Bastard's glowing tame.
Born to himself, by no possession led,
'n freedom foster'd, and by fortune fed;
Vor guides, nor rules, his sovereign choice
control,

Is chance a guilt? that my disastrous heart, For mischief never meant, must ever smart? Can self-defence be sin?-Ah, plead no more! What tho' no purpos'd malice stain'd thee o'er, Had Heaven befriended thy unhappy side, Thou hadst not been provok'd-or thou hadst

died.

Far be the guilt of homeshed blood from all
On whom, unsought, embroiling dangers fall!
Still the pale dead revives, and lives to me,
To me, through Pity's eye condemn'd to see!
Remembrance veils his rage, but swells his
fate;

one day,

His body independent as his soul; [aim,
00s'd to the world's wide range-enjoin'd no
Prescrib'd no duty, and assign'd no name :
Nature's unbounded son, he stands alone,
His heart unbiass'd, and his mind his own.
O Mother, yet no Mother! 'tis to you
ly thanks for such distinguish'd claims are due.
ou, unenslav'd to Nature's narrow laws,
Varm champion ess for Freedom's sacred cause,
rom all the dry devoirs of blood and line,
rom ties material, moral, and divine, [shore,
Fischarg'd ny grasping soul; push'd me from
nd launch'd me into life without an oar.
What had I lost, if, conjugally kind,
y nature hating, yet by vows confin'd,
Intaught the matrimonial bounds to slight,
nd coldly conscious of a husband's right,
ou had faint drawn me with a form alone,
Jawful lump of life, by force your own!
hen, while your backward will recrench'd de-
nd unconcurring spirits lent no fire, [sire,
had been born your dull, domestic heir,
oid of your life, and motive of your care;
erhaps been poorly rich, and ineanly great,
The slave of pomp, a cypher in the state;
ordly neglectful of a worth unknown,
and slumbering in a seat by chance my own.
Far nobler blessings wait the Bastard's lot;
onceiv'd in rapture, and with fire begot!
trong as necessity, he starts away,
limbs against wrongs, and brightens into day.
Thus unprophetic, lately misinspir'd, Lost to the life you gave, your son no more,
sung: gay futt'ring hope my fancy fir'd; And now adopted, who was doom'd before,
nly secure, through conscious scorn of ill, New-born, Imay a nobler Mother claim,
Nor taught by wisdom how to balance will, But dare not whisper her immortal name;
Rashly deceiv'd, I saw no pits to shun,
Supremely lovely, and serenely great!
But thought to purpose and to act were one; Majestic Mother of a kneeling Statel
Heedless what pointed cares pervert his way,QUEEN of a people's heart wilo ne'er before
Whom caution arms not, and whom woes be-Agreed-yet now with one consentadore!
One contest yet remains in this desire,

Griev'd I forgive, and am grown cool too late.
Young and unthoughtful then, who knows,
[way!
What ripening virtues might have made their
He might have liv'd till folly died in shame,
Till kindling wisdom felt a thirst for fame.
He might perhaps his country's friend have
prov'd;

Both happy, generous, candid, and belov'd;
He might have sav'd some worth now doom'd
to fall;

And I perchance, in him, have murder'd all.

O fate of late repentance, always vain!
Thy remedies but lull undying pain. [care
Where shall my hope find rest?-No mother's
Shielded my infant innocence with prayer:
No father's guardian hand my youth main-
tain'd,

tray;

Call'd forth my virtues, or from vice restrain'd,
Is it not thine to snatch some pow'rful arm,
First to advance, then screen from future
harm?

Am I return'd from death, to live in pain?
Or would Imperial Pity save in vain?'
Distrust it not-what blame can mercy find,
Which gives at once a life, and rears a mind?

Mother miscali'd, farewel!--of soul severe,
This sad reflection yet may force one tear:
All I was wretched by, to you I ow'd;
Alone from strangers every comfort flow'd!

But now expos'd, and shrinking from distress, Who most shall give applause, where all adI fly to shelter, while the tempests press;

mire.

3 B

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146.

788

§ 146. On the Recovery of a Lady of Quality
from the Small-Pox. SAVAGE
ONG a lov'd fair had bless'd her consort's
sight

LON

With amorous pride, and undisturb'd delight;
Till death, grown envious, with repugnantaim
Frown'd at their joys, and urg'd a tyrant's
claim.

He summons each disease!-the noxious crew,
Writhing in dire distortions, strike his view!
From various plagues, which various natures
know,

Forth rushes beauty's fear'd and fervent foe.
Fierce to the fair the missile mischief flies,
The sanguine streams in raging ferments rise!
It drives, ignipotent through every vein,
Hangs on the heart, and burns around the brain!
Now a chill damp the charmer's lustre diuns!
Sad o'er her eyes the livid languor swims!
Her eyes, that with a glance could joy inspire,
Like setting stars, scarce shoot a glimmering fire.
Here stands her consort, sore with anguish
press'd,

Grief in his eye, and terror in his breast.
The Paphian Graces, smit with anxious care,
In silent sorrow weep the waning fair.
Eight suns, successive, roll their fire away,
And eight slow nights see their deep shades

Receive my humble rite:
Thy sky-worn robes of tenderest blue,
Long, Pity, let the nations view
But wherefore need I wander wide
And eyes of dewy light!
To old Ilissus' distant side,

Deserted stream, and mute?
And Echo, 'midst my native plains,
Wild Arun too has heard thy strains,
There first the wren thy myrtles shed
Been sooth'd by Pity's lute.
On gentlest Otway's inf. ut head;

With youth's soft notes unspoil'd by art,
To him thy cell was shewn:
And while he sung the female heart,

Thy turtles mix'd their own.
Come, Pity, come, by fancy's aid,
Thy temple's pride design:
Ev'n now my thoughts, relenting maid,
Its southern site, its truth complete
Shall raise a wild enthusiast heat,

In all who view the shrine.
How chance or hard involving fate,
There Picture's toil shall well relate

O'er inortal bliss prevail:

And sighing prompt her tender hand, The buskin'd Muse shall near her stand, decay. While these revolve, tho' mute each Muse ap-There let me oft, retir'd by day, [pears, With each disastrous tale. Each speaking eye drops éloquence in tears. On the ninth noon great Phoebus listening

bends,

In dreams of passion melt away, Allow'd with thee to dwell: scends | There waste the mournful lamp of night,

To hear a British shell!

On the ninth noon each voice in prayer as-Till, Virgin, thou again delight
Great God of light, of song, and physic's art,
Restore the languid fair, new soul impart!
Her beauty, wit, and virtue claim thy care,
And thine own bounty's almost rivalf'd there.
Each paus'd; the god assents. Would death
advance?

Phoebus unséen arrests that threatening lance!
Down from his orb a vivid influence streams,
And quickening earth imbibes salubrious

beams;

Each balmy plant increase of virtue knows,
And art inspir'd with all her patron glows.
The charmer's opening eye kind hope reveals,
Kind hope her consort's breast enlivening feels;
Fach grace revives, each Muse resumes the lyre,
Each beauty brightens with relumin'd fire:
As Health's auspicious pow'rs gay life display,
Death, sullen at the sight, stalks slow away.

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COLLINS.

THOU, to whom the world unknown
$148. Ode to Fear.

Who seest appall'd th' unreal scene,
With all its shadowy shapes is shown;
While Fancy lifts the veil between :

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Ah, Fear! ah, frantic Fear!

I see, I see thee near.
know thy hurried step, thy haggard eye!
Like thee I start, like thee disorder'd fly;
Danger, whose limbs of giant mould
For, lo, what monsters in thy train appear
What mortal eye can fix'd behold?
Howling amidst the midnight storm,
Who stalks his round, an hideous form,
Or throws him on the rigid steep
Of some loose hanging rock to sleep;
And with him thousand phantoms join'd,
Who prompt to deeds accurst the mind:
O'er nature's wounds and wrecks preside;
And those, the fiends, who near allied,
While Vengeance, in the lurid air,
Lifts her red arm, expos'd and bare:
On whom that ravening brood of fate,
Who lap the blood of Sorrow, wait;
Who, Fear, this ghastly train can see,
And look not madly wild, like thee?

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EPODE.

In earliest Greece, to thee, with partial choice,
The grief-full Muse address'd her infant
tongue.

The maids and matrons, on her awful voice,
Silent and pale, in wild amazement hung.
Yet he, the Bard who first invok'd thy name,
Disdain'd in Marathon its pow'r to feel:
For not alone he nurs'd the poet's Alaine,
But reach'd from Virtue's hand the patriot's
steel.

But who is he, whom later garlands grace,
Who left awhile o'er Hybla's dews to rove,
With trembling eyes thy dreary steps to trace,
Where thousand furies shar'd the baleful
grove ?

Wrapt in thy cloudy veil th' incestuous Queen ↑
Sigh'd the sad call her son and husband heard,
When once alone it broke the silent scene,
And he the wretch of Thebes no more ap-
pear'd.

O Fear, I know thee by my throbbing heart,
Thy withering pow'r inspir'd each mournful
line;

Though gentle Pity claim her mingled part,
Yet all the thunders of the scene are thine.

ANTISTROPHE.

Thou, who such weary length hast past,
Where wilt thou rest, mad nymph, at last?
hy, wilt thou shroud in baunted cell,
Where gloomy Rape and Murder dwell?
Orin some hollow'd seat,

Gainst which the big waves beat,
Hear drowning seamen's cries in tempests
brought!
[thought,
Dark pow'r, with shuddering meek submitted
Be mine, to read the visions old,
Which thy awakening bards have told.

And, lest thou meet my blasted view,
Hold each strange tale devoutly true;
Ne'er be I found, by thee o'eraw'd,
In that thrice-hallow'd eve abroad;
When ghosts, as cottage maids believe,
Their pebbled beds permitted leave,
And goblins haunt from fire, or fen,
Or mine, or flood, the walks of men!
O thou, whose spirit most possess'd
The sacred seat of Shakspeare's breast!
By all that from thy prophet broke,
In thy divine emotions spoke!
Hither again thy fury deal,

Teach me but once like him to feel;
His
cypress wreath my maced decree;
And I, O Fear, will dwell with thee!"

$149. Ode to Simplicity. COLLINS.
THOU, by Nature taught,

To breathe her genuine thought,
In numbers warmly pure, and sweetly strong:

Who first on mountains wild,
In Fancy, loveliest child,
[song
Thy babe and Pleasure's nurs'd the pow'ts o,

• Eschylus.

↑ Jocasta.

!

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In attic robe array'd,

O chaste, unboastful nymph, to thee I call!
By all the honey'd store

On Hybla's thymy shore,

By all her blooms, and mingled murmurs dear,
By her whose love-lørn woe,

In evening musings slow,

Sooth'd sweetly sad Electra's poet's ear:
By old Cephisus deep,

Who spread his wavy sweep,

In warbled wand'rings round thy green retreat,
On whose enamell'd side,

When holy Freedom died,
No equal haunt allur'd thy future feet.
O sister meek of Truth,

To my admiring youth

Thy sober aid and native charms infuse!
The flow'rs that sweetest breathe,
Though beauty cull'd the wreath,

Still ask thy hand to range their order'd hues.
While Rome could none esteem,
But virtue's patriot theme,

You lov'd her hills, and led her laureate band;
But staid to sing alone

To one distinguish'd throne,

And turn'd thy face, and fled her alter'd land.
No more, in hall or bow'r,

The passions own thy pow'r.

Love, only Love, her forceless numbers mean;
For thou hast left her shrine,
Nor olive more, nor vine,

Shall gain thy feet to bless the servile scene.
Though taste, though genius bless

To some divine excess,

Faint's the cold work till thou inspire the whole;
What each, what all supply,

May court, may charm our eye,
Thou, only thou, canst raise the meeting soul!
Of these let others ask,

To aid some mighty task,
I only seek to find thy temperate vale;
Where oft my reed might sound

To maids and shepherds round,
And all thy sons, O Nature, learn my tale.

§ 150. Ode on the Poetical Character.
COLLINS.

As one, if, not with light regard,

I read aright that gifted Bard,
(Him whose school above the rest
His loveliest Elfin queen has bless'd),
One, only one unrivall'd fair
May hope the magic girdle wear,
At solemn tournay hung on high,

The wish of each love-darting eye:
Lo! to each other nymph in turn applied,
As if, in air unseen, some hovering hand,
Some chaste and angel-friend to virgin fame,
Florimel. See Spenser. Leg. 4.

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The band, as fairy legends say,
Was wove on that creating day
When he, who call'd with thought to birth
Yon tented sky, this laughing earth,
And dress'd with springs, and forests tall,
And pour'd the main engirting all,
Long by the lov'd enthusiast woo'd,
Himself in some diviner mood,
Retiring, sate with her alone,
And plac'd her on his sapphire throne,
The whiles, the vaulted shrine around,
Seraphic wires were heard to sound,
Now sublimest triumph swelling;
Now on love and mercy dwelling;
And she from out the veiling cloud
Breath'd her magic notes aloud: -
And thou, thou rich-hair'd youth of morn,
And all thy subject life was born.
The dangerous passions kept aloof,
Far from the sainted growing woof:
But near it sat ecstatic Wonder,
Listening the deep applauding thunder:
And Truth, in sunny vest array'd,
By whose the Tarsol's eyes were made;
All the shadowy tribes of mind,
In braided dance their murmurs join'd,
And all the bright uncounted pow'rs,
Who feed on heaven's ambrosial flow'rs.
Where is the Bard whose soul can now
Its high presuming hopes avow?
Where he who thinks, with rapture blind,
This hallow'd work for him design'd?
High on some cliff to heaven up-pil'd,
Of rude access, of prospect wild,
Where tangled round the jealous deep,
Strange shades o'erbrow the vallies deep,
And holy Genii guard the rock,
Its glooms embrown, its springs unlock;
While on its rich ambitious head
An Eden, like his own, lies spread,
I view that oak, the fancied glades among,
By which a Milton lay; his evening ear,
From many a cloud that dropp'd ethereal dew,
Nigh spher'd in heaven its native strains could
Thung:

hear:

On which that ancient trump he reach'd was
Thither oft his glory greeting,

From Waller's myrtle shades retreating,
With many a vow from Hope's aspiring

tongue,

In vain-such bliss to one alone
Of all the sons of soul was known,
And Heaven and Fancy, kindred pow'rs,
Have now o'erturn'd th' inspiring bow'rs,
Or curtain'd close such scene from every fe
ture view.

§ 151. Ode. Written in the Year 1746.
COLLINA
ow sleep the brave, who sink to rest

How
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
By all their country's wishes blest!

Returns to deck their hallow'd mould,
She there shall dress a sweeter sod
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.
By Fairy hands their knell is wrung,
By forms unseen their dirge is sung;
There Honour comes, a pilgrim grey,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay;
And Freedom shall awhile repair,
To dwell a weeping hermit there!

§ 152. Ode to Mercy. COLLINS.

STROPHE.

THOU, who sitt'st a smiling bride

By Valour's arm'd and awful side, Gentlest of sky-born forms, and best ador Who oft with songs, divine to hear,

Winn'st from his fatal grasp the spear, And hid'st in wreaths of flowers his bloode sword?

Thou who, amidst the deathful field,
By godlike chiefs alone beheld,

Oft with thy bosom bare art found,
Pleading for him the youth who sinks
ground:

See, Mercy, see, with pure and loaded he Before thy shrine my country's geninsta And decks thy altar still, tho' pierc'd with a wound!

ANTISTROPHE.

When he whom ev'n our joys provoke,
The fiend of Nature, join'd his yoke,
And rush'd in wrath to make our isle his
Thy form, from out thy sweet abode,
O'ertook him on his blasted road, fa
And stopp'd his wheels, and look'd his
I see recoil'd his sable steeds,

That bore him swift to savage deeds;
Thy tender melting eyes they own,
O Maid, for all thy love to Britain shewn,
Where Justice bars her iron tow'r,
To thee we build a roseate bow'r,
Thou, thou shalt rule our queen, and shar
our monarch's throne.

§ 153. Ode to Liberty. COLLINS,

STROPHE

My trembling feet his guiding steps pursue ;

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