Y.
Like Eastern Kings a lazy flate they keep,
And, clofe confin'd to their own palace, fleep.
From these perhaps (ere Nature bade her die)
Fate fnatch'd her early to the pitying sky.
As into air the purer fpirits flow,
And fep❜rate from their kindred dregs below;
So flew the foul to its congenial place,
Nor left one virtue to redeem her race.
But thou, falfe guardian of a charge too good,
Thou, mean deferter of thy brother's blood!
See on these ruby lips the trembling breath,
These cheeks, now fading at the blast of death;
Cold is that breast which warm'd the world before,
And those love-darting eyes must roll no more.
Thus, if eternal Justice rules the ball,
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Thus fhall your wives, and thus your children fall:
On all the line a fudden vengeance waits,
And frequent herfes fhall befiege your gates;
There paffengers shall stand, and pointing say,
(While the long fun'rals blacken all the way)
Lo! thefe were they, whofe fouls the Furies fteel'd,
And curs'd with hearts unknowing how to yield.
Thus unlamented pafs the proud away,
The
gaze of fools, and pageant of a day!
So perish all, whose breaft ne'er learn'd to glow
For others good, or melt at others woe.
What can atone (oh ever injur'd shade !)
Thy fate unpity'd, and thy rites unpaid?
No friend's complaint, no kind domestic tear
Pleas'd thy pale ghoft, or grac'd thy mournful bier: 50
By foreign hands thy dying eyes were clos'd,
By foreign hands thy decent limbs compos'd,
By foreign hands thy humble grave adorn'd,
By firangers honour'd, and by ftrangers mourn'd!
What tho' no friends in fable weeds appear,
Grieve for an hour, perhaps, then mourn a year,
And bear about the mockery of woe
To midnight dances, and the public show?
What tho' no weeping Loves thy ashes grace,
Nor polish'd marble emulate thy face?
What tho' no facred earth allow thee room,
Nor hallow'd dirge be mutter'd o'er thy tomb?
Yet fhall thy grave with rifing flow'rs be drefs'd,
And the green turf lie lightly on thy breast:
There shall the morn her earliest tears bestow,
There the first roses of the year shall blow;
While Angels with their filver wings o'ershade
The ground now facred by thy reliques made.
So, peaceful, refts without a stone, a name,
What once had beauty, titles, wealth, and fame.
How lov'd, how honour'd once, avails thee not,
To whom related, or by whom begot;
A heap of duft alone remains of thee,
"Tis all thou art, and all the proud fhall be !
Poets themselves must fall, like those they fung, 75 Deaf the prais'd ear, and mute the tuneful tongue. Ev'n he, whose foul now melts in mournful lays, Shall shortly want the gen'rous tear he pays; Then from his closing eyes thy form fhall part, And the last pang fhall tear thee from his heart, Life's idle bus'ness at once gasp be o'er, The Mufe forgot, and thou belov'd no more!
O.
Ti
O wake the foul by tender ftrokes of art,
To raise the genius, and to mend the heart;
To make mankind in conscious virtue bold,
Live o'er each scene, and be what they behold:
For this the Tragic Muse first trod the stage,
Commanding tears to stream thro' ev'ry age;
Tyrants no more their savage nature kept,
And foes to virtue wonder'd how they wept.
Our author fhuns by vulgar fprings to move
The hero's glory, or the virgin's love;
In pitying Love, we but our weakness fhow,
And wild Ambition well deserves its woe.
Here tears shall flow from a more gen'rous cause,
Such tears as Patriots shed for dying Laws:
He bids your breasts with ancient ardour rife,
And calls forth Roman drops from British eyes.
Virtue confess'd in human shape he draws,
What Plato thought, and godlike Cato was :
No common object to your fight displays,
But what with pleasure Heav'n itself surveys,
A brave man ftruggling in the ftorms of fate,
And greatly falling with a falling state,
While Cato gives his little Senate laws,
What bofom beats not in his Country's caufe?
Who fees him act, but envies ev'ry deed?
Who hears him groan, and does not wish to bleed?
Ev'n when proud Cæfar 'midft triumphal cars,
The fpoils of nations, and the pomp of wars,
Ignobly vain and impotently great,
25
Show'd Rome her Cato's figure drawn in state;
As her dead Father's rev'rend image past,
The pomp was darken'd, and the day o'ercaft ;
The triumph ceas'd, tears gufh'd from ev'ry eye;
The world's great Victor pafs'd unheeded by;
Her laft good man dejected Rome ador'd,
And honour'd Cæfar's lefs than Cato's fword.
Britons, attend: be worth like this approv'd,
And show, you have the virtue to be mov'd.
With honeft fcorn the firft fam'd Cato view'd
Rome learning arts from Greece, whom fhe fubdu'd;
Your scene precarioufly fubfifts too long.
On French tranflation, and Italian fong.
Dare to have sense yourselves; affert the stage,
Be juftly warm'd with your own native
Such plays alone fhould win a British ear,
As Cato's felf had not difdain'd to hear.
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rage:
Mr. Rowe's JANE SHORE.
Defigned for Mrs. OLDFIELD.
PRODIGIOUS this! the Frail one of our Play
From her own fex fhould mercy find to-day!
You might have held the pretty head afide,
Peep'd in your fans, been ferious, thus, and cry'd,
The Play may pass - but that strange creature, Shore,
I can't indeed now I fo hate a whore
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Juft as a blockhead rubs his thoughtless fkull,
And thanks his ftars he was not born a fool;
So from a fifter finner you fhall hear,
"How ftrangely you expofe yourfelf, my dear " 10 But let me die, all raillery apart,
Our fex are still forgiving at their heart;
And, did not wicked cuftom fo contrive,
We'd be the beft, good-natur'd things alive.
There are, 'tis true, who tell another tale,
That virtuous ladies envy while they rail;
Such
rage without betrays the fire within ;
In fome close corner of the foul, they fin;
Still hoarding up, most scantialously nice,
Amidst their virtues a referve of vice.
The godly dame, who fleshly failings damns,
Scolds with her maid, or with her chaplain crams.
VOL. I.
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