to be pleading for an exemption from criticism; I would only have it circumfcribed within the rules of candour and humanity: writers may be told of their errors, provided it be with the decency and tenderness of a friend, not the malice and paffion of an enemy; boys may be whipped into fenfe, but men are to be guided with reason.

If we grant the malicious critic all that he claims, and allow him to have proved his adverfary's dulnefs, and his own acutenefs, yet, as long as there is virtue in the world, modeft dulnefs will be preferable to learned arrogance: Dulness may be a misfortune, but arrogance is a crime; and where is the mighty advantage, if, while he difcovers more learning, he is found to have lefs virtue than his adverfary? And though he be a better critic, yet proves himself to be a worfe man? Befides, no one is to be envied the skill in finding fuch faults as others are fo dull as to mistake for beauties. What advantage is such a quickfightedness even to the poffeffors of it? It makes them difficult to be pleased, and gives them pain, while others receive a pleasure : they resemble the fecond-fighted people in Scotland, who are fabled to fee more than other perfons; but all the benefit they reap from this privilege, is to discover cbic&ts of horror, ghofts, and apparitions.

But it is time to end, though I have too much reason to enlarge the argument for candour in criticism, through a confciousness of my own deficiency: I have in reality been pleading my own caufe, that if I appear too guilty to obtain a pardon, I may find fo much

mercy

mercy from my judges, as to be condemned to fuffer without inhumanity: But whatever be the fate of these works, they have proved of ufe to me, and been an agreeable amusement in a constant folitude. Providence has been pleased to lead me out of the great roads of life, into a private path; where, though we have leisure to chufe the fmootheft way, yet we are all fure to meet many obstacles in the journey: I have found poetry an innocent companion, and support from the fatigues of it; how long, or how short, the future stages of it are to be, as it is uncertain, so it is a folly to be over-folicitous about it; he that lives the longeft, has but the fmall privilege of creeping more leisurely than others to his grave; what we call living, is in reality but a longer time of dying and if these verses prove as fhort-lived as their author, it is a lofs not worth regretting They only die, as they were born, in obfcurity.

POEMS

BY

DR. BROOM E.

HABBAKKUK, Chap. III. Paraphrafed.

An ODE, written in 1710, as an Exercise.

WHEN in a glorious terrible array,

From Paran's towering height th' Almighty took his

Borne on a cherub's wings he rode,

Intolerable day proclaim'd the God;
No earthly cloud

Could his effulgent brightness shroud :
Glory, and majefty, and power,
March'd in a dreadful pomp before;

Behind, a grim and meagre train,

Pining sickness, frantic pain,

[way;

Stalk'd widely on! with all the dismal band, Which heaven in anger fends to fcourge a guilty land.

With terror cloath'd, he downward flew, And wither'd half the nations with a view; Through half the nations of th' astonish'd earth He scatter'd war, and plagues, and dearth!

And

And when he spoke,

The everlafting hills from their foundations fhook;
The trembling mountains, by a lowly nod,
With reverence ftruck, confefs'd the God:
On Sion's holy hill he took his stand,
Grafping omnipotence in his right hand;
Then mighty earthquakes rock'd the ground,
And the fun darken'd as he frown'd:
He dealt affliction from his van,
And wild confufion from his rear;
They through the tents of Cufhan ran,
The tents of Cufhan quak'd with fear,
And Midian trembled with despair.
I fee! his fword wave naked in the air;
It sheds around a baleful ray,

The rains pour down, the lightnings play,
And on their wings vindictive thunders bear.

When through the mighty flood,

He led the murmuring croud,

What ail'd the rivers that they backward fled?
Why was the mighty flood afraid?
March'd he against the rivers? or was he,
Thou mighty flood! difpleas'd at thee?

VARIATION.

I fee his fword wave with redoubled ire.
Ah! has it fet the very clouds on fire?
The clouds burft down in deluges of fhowers;
Fierce lightning flames, vindictive thunder roars.

The

The flood beheld from far,

The deity in all his equipage of war;
And lo! at once it bursts! in diverfe falls
On either hand! it fwells in crystal walls!
Th' eternal rocks disclose! the toffing waves
Rufh in loud thunder from a thousand caves!
Why tremble ye, O! faithlefs, to behold

The opening deeps their gulphs unfold ?
Enter the dreadful chafms! 'tis God, who guides
Your wondrous way! the God who rules the tides!
And lo! they march amid the deafening roar
Of tumbling seas! they mount the adverse shore!
Advance, ye chosen tribes !—Arabia's fands
Lonely, uncomfortable lands!

Void of fountain, void of rain,
Oppose their burning coafts in vain!
See the great prophet stand,
Waving his wonder-working wand!

He ftrikes the ftubborn rock, and lo!

The stubborn rock feels the Almighty blow;

His ftony entrails burst, and rushing torrents flow.

* Then did the fun his fiery courfers stay,
And backward held the falling day;

VARIATION.

Ah, what new scenes unfold, what voice I hear; Sun, ftand thou ftill; thou moon, thy courfe forbear: Ah,.... fun, thy wheels obedient say,

Doubling the fplendors of the wondrous day.