16. Hymn to Cheerfulness-The Author being fick. Dr. AKENSIDE.

How

thick the fhades of evening close !
How pale the fky with weight of fnows!
Hafte, light the tapers, urge the fire,
And bid the joyless day retire!
Alas, in vain I try within
To raise the dull, dejected feene,
While rous'd by grief these fiery pains
Tear the frail texture of my veins;
While winter's voice, that forms around,
And yon deep death-bell's groaning found
Renew my mind's oppreffive gloom,
Till ftarting horror thakes the room.

Is there in nature no kind power
To footh affliction's lonely hour?
To blunt the edge of dire difeafe,
And teach thefe wintry thades to please?
Come, Cheerfulnefs, triumphant fair,
Shine thro' the painful cloud of care:
O fweet of language, mild of mien,
O virtue's friend and pleafure's queen
Affuage the flames that burn my breaft,
Attune my jarring thoughts to reft;
And while thy gracious gifts I feel,
My fong fhall all thy praife reveal.

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As once ('twas in Aftrea's reign) The vernal pow'rs renew'd their train;

It happen'd that immortal Love
Was ranging thro' the fpheres above,
And downward hither caft his eye,
The year's returning pomp to fpy :
He faw the radiant God of day
Lead round the globe the rofy May;
The fragrant Airs and genial Hours
Were fhedding round him dews and flowers;
Before his wheels Aurora pafs'd,
And Helper's golden lamp was laft.
But, fairest of the blooming throng,
When Health majestic mov'd along,
All
gay with fimiles, to fee below
The joys which from her prefence flow,
While carth enliven'd hears her voice,
And fields, and flocks, and fwains rejoice;
Then mighty Love her charms confefs'd,
And foon his vows inclin'd her breaft,
And, known from that aufpicious morn,
The pleafing Cheerfuluefs was born.

Thou, Cheerfulness, by Heav'n defign'd To rule the pulfe that moves the mind, Whatever fretful paffion springs, Whatever chance or nature brings To ftrain the tuneful poize within, And difarrange the fweet machine; Thou, goddefs, with a mafter-hand Doft each attemper'd key command, Refine the foft and fwell the ftrong, Tili all is concord, all is fong.

Fair guardian of domestic life, Beft banisher of home-bred ftrife, Nor fullen lip, nor taunting eye Deform the fcene where thou art by: No fickening husband damns the hour That bound his joys to female power: No pining mother weeps the cares That parents wafte on hopeless heirs: Th' officious daughters pleas'd attend; The brother rifes to the friend:

By thee their board with flowers is crown'd,
By thee with fongs their walks refound,
By thee their sprightly mornings fhine,
And evening-hours in peace decline.

Behold the youth, whofe trembling heart
Beats high with love's unpitied fmart;
Tho' now he ftrays by rills and bowers,
And weeping wears the lonely hours;
Or, if the nymph her audience deign,
Shames the foft story of his pain
With flavish looks, difcolour'd eyes,
And accents faltering into fighs;
Yet thou, aufpicious power, with cafe,
Canft yield him happier arts to pleate,
Exalt his mien to manlier charms,
Inftruct his tongue with nobler arins,
With more commanding paffion move,
And teach the dignity of love.

Friend to the Mufe and all her train,
For thee I court the Mufe again;
And may the votive lay difclofe
How much to thy fair aid fhe owes !
See, when thy touch reveals her mine,
How pure the ftores of fancy fhine;

Hark,

;

Hark, when thy breath her fong impels, How full the tuneful current fwells. Let Melancholy's plaintive tongue Inftruct the nightly ftrains of Y But thine was Homer's ancient might, And thine victorious Pindar's flight: Thy myrtles crown'd the Lefbian meads; Thy voice awak'd + Sicilian reeds; Thy breath perfumes the Teian rose, And Tiber's vine fpontaneous flows, While Horace wantons in thy quire; The gods and heroes of the lyre. See where the pale, the fick'ning fage (A prey perhaps to fortune's rage, Perhaps by tender griefs oppreft, Or glooms congenial to his breaft) Retires in defert-fcenes to dwell, And bids the joyless world farewel. Alone he treads th' autumnal fhade, Alone beneath the mountain laid, He fees the nightly damps arife, And gathering ftorms involve the skies; He hears the neighb'ring furges roll, And raging thunders thake the pole; Then, ftruck by every object round, And funn'd by ev'ry horrid found, He pants to traverfe nature's ways: His evils haunt him thro' the maze: He views ten thoufand demons rife, To wield the empire of the skies, And Chance and Fate affume the rod, And Malice blots the throne of GOD. -0 thou, whofe pleafing power I fing! Thy lenient influence hither bring; Compofe the ftorm, difpel the gloom, Till Nature wear her wonted bloom, Till fields and fhades their fweets exhale, And mufic fwell each opening gale: Then o'er his breaft thy foftnels pour, And let him learn the timely hour To trace the world's benignant laws, And judge of that prefiding caufe Who founds in difcord beauty's reign, Converts to pleasure every pain, Subdues the hoftile forms to reft, And bids the universe be bleft.

O thou, whose pleasing power I fing! If right I touch the votive ftring, If equal praife I yield thy name, Still govern thou thy poet's flame; Still with the Mufe my bofom thare, And footh to peace corroding care. But moft exert thy genial power On friendship's confecrated hour: And while my Agis leads the road To fearless wisdom's high abode; Or, warm in freedom's facred caufe, Purfoes the light of Grecian laws; Attend, and grace our gen'rous toils With all thy garlands, all thy fimiles. But if, by fortune's stubborn fway From him and friendship torn away, I court the Mufe's healing spell For griefs that still with abfence dwell, * Alcxus and Sappho.

Within due bounds the mighty ocean keeps,
And in their watery cavern awes the deeps.
Shook by that voice, the nodding groves around
Start from their roots, and fly the dreadful found.
The blafted cedars low in duft are laid,

And Lebanon is left without a fhade.

§19. Pfalm 29th. PITT. YE mighty princes, your oblations bring,

Ἐ

And pay due honours to your awful King; His boundief's power to all the world proclaim, Bend at his fhrine, and tremble at his name. For hark his voice, with unrefifted fway, Rules and controuls the raging of the Sea;

See! when he speaks, the lofty mountains crowd,"
And fly for fhelter from the thundering God:
Sirion and Lebanon like hinds advance,
And in wild meafures lead th' unwieldy dance.
His voice, his mighty voice, divides the fire,
Back from the blaft the fhrinking flames retire.
Ev'n Cades trembles when Jehovah fpeaks,
With all his Savages the defert fhakes.
At the dread found the hinds with fear are ftung,
And in the lonely foreft drop their young;
While in his hallow'd temple all proclaim
His glorious honours, and adore his name.
High o'er the foaming furges of the fea
He fits, and bids the liftening deeps obey:
He reigns o'er all; for ever lafts his power,
Till nature finks, and time fhall be no more.
With ftrength the fons of Ifrael fhall he blefs,
And crown our tribes with happiness and peace.

He taught me first the pointed fpear to wield,
And mow the glorious harveft of the field.
By him infpir'd, from ftrength to ftrength I pafs'd,
Plung'd through the troops, and laid the battle
In him my hopes I centre and repofe, [wafte.
He guards my life, and shields me from my foes.
He held his ample buckler o'er my head,
And fcreen'd me trembling in the mighty shade:
Against all hoftile violence and power,
He was my fword, my bulwark, and my tower.
He o'er my people will maintain my fway,
And teach my willing fubjects to obey.

Lord! what is man, of vile and humble birth,
Sprung with his kindred reptiles from the carth,
That he fhould thus thy fecret counfels fhare?
Or what his fon, who challenges thy care?
Why does thine eye regard this nothing, man?
His life a point, his meafure but a fpan ?
The fancy'd pageant of a moment made,
Swift as a dream, and flecting as a fhade.

Come in thy power, and leave th' ethereal plain, And to thy harness'd tempeft give the rein; Yon ftarry arch fhall bend beneath the load, So loud the chariot, and fo great the God! Soon as his rapid wheels Jehovah rolls, The folding fkies fhall tremble to the poles: Heaven's gaudy Axle with the world shall fall, Leap from the centre, and unhinge the ball.

Pil'd up with plenty let our barns appear,
And burft with all the Scafons of the Year;
Let pregnant flocks in every quarter bleat,
And drop their tender young in every fircet.
Safe from their labours may our oxen come,
Safe may they bring the gather'd fummer home.
Oh! may no fighs, no ftreams of forrow flow,
To ftain our triumphs with the tears of woc.

Bleft is the nation, how fincerely bleft!
Of fuch unbounded happiness poffeft,
To whom Jehovah's facred name is known,
Who claim the God of Ifrael for their own.

Touch'd by thy hands,the labouring hills expire Thick clouds of fmoke, and deluges of fire; On the tall groves the red deftroyer preys, And wraps th' eternal mountains in the blaze: Full on my foes may all thy lightnings fly, On purple pinions through the gloomy fky.

Extend thy hand, thou kind all-gracious God, Down from the heaven of heavens thy brightabode, And fhield me from my foes, whole towering pride Lowers like a ftorm, and gathers like a tide: Against ftrange children vindicate my caufe, Who curfe thy name, and trample on thy laws; Who fear not vengeance which they never felt, Train'd to blafpheme, and eloquent in guilt: Their hands are impious, and their deeds profane; They plead their boafted innocence in vain.

Thy name fhall dwell for ever on my tongue, And guide the facred numbers of my fong; To thee my Mufe thall confecrate her lays, And every note fhall labour in thy praife; The hallow'd theme fhall teach me how to fing, Swell on the lyre, and tremble on the ftring.

Oft has thy hand from fight the monarch led, When death flew raging, and the battle bled; And thatch'd thy fervant in the laft defpair From all the rifing tumult of the war.

Against strange children vindicate my cause, Who curfe thy name, and trample on thy laws; That our fair fons may finile in early bloom, Our fons, the hopes of all our years to come; Likeplants that nurs'd by fostering fhowers arife, And lift their fpreading honours to the skies: That our chafte daughters may their charms difplay,

Like the bright pillars of our temple, gay, Polish'd, and tall, and finooth, and fair as they.

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23. The 34 Chapter of Job. PITT.

OB curs'd his birth, and bade his curfes flow In words of grief, and eloquence of woe: Loft be that day which dragg'd me to my doom, Recent to life, and ftruggling from the womb; Whose beams with fuch malignant luftre fhone, Whence all my years in anxious circles run. Loft be that night in undetermin'd fpace, And veil with deeper fhades her gloomy face, Which crowded up with woes this flender fpan, While the dull mafs rofe quick'ning into man.

O'er that curs'd day let fable darknets rife, Shroud the blue vault, and blacken all the fkies; May God o'erlook it from his heavenly throne, Nor roufe from fleep the fedentary fun, O'er its dark face to thed his genial ray, And warm to joy the melancholy day. May the clouds frown, and livid poisons breathe, And ftain heaven's azure with the fhade of death. May ten-fold darkucts from that dreadful night

Seize and arreft the fraggling gleams of light;
To pay due vengeance for its fatal crime,
Still be it banifh'd from the train of time;
Nor in the radiant lift of months appear,
To ftain the fhining circle of the Year:
There through her dufky range may filence

roam,

There may no ray, no glimpse of gladnefs come;
No voice to cheer the folitary gloom.
May every ftar his gaudy light with-hold,
Nor through the vapour fhoot his beamy gold;
Nor let the dawn with radiant fkirts come on,
Tipp'd with the glories of the rifing fun;
Because that dreadful period fix'd my doom,
Nor feal'd the dark receffes of the womb.
To that original my ills I owe;
Heir of affliction, and the fon of woe.
Oh! had I died unexercis'd in pain,
And wak'd to life, to fleep in death again!
Why did not Fate attend me at my birth,
And give me back to my congenial earth?
Why was I, when an infant, footh'd to rest,
Lull'd on the knee, or hung upon the breaft?
For now the grave would all my cares compofe,
Conceal my forrows, and inter my woes:
There wrapp'dand lock'd within his cold embrace,
Safe had I lumber'd in the arms of peace;
There with the mighty kings, who lie inroll'd
In clouds of mcenfe, and in beds of gold:

There