ON SEEING A ROSE IN OCTOBER.
Hrice happy flower, what heavenly aid Supports thy ftrength, while others fade? What quickening spirit makes thee blow, While all thy fifters droop below? Sure there's a spark of heavenly flame, That shoots its warmth throughout thy frame; Some inborn effence moft refin'd,
Some genial virtue good and kind,
That makes thy blushing beauties blow,
And thy mellifluous fweets to flow;
That gives new life, and rears thy head,
When all thy beauteous race lie dead.
Thou, charming rofe! art now most rare,
And would't be quite beyond compare ;
But that my Delia, but that she,
Is lovely, fair, and fweet like thee:
Like thee, when other beauties pine,
She glows with virtue, and shall shine;
Deep in the heart the blessing lies,
The spark divine that never dies:
Which (when the froft of age invades,
When on her cheek thy picture fades)
Shall give new grace, new life, new air,
And make her eminently fair.
ON THE DEATH OF DR. PARNE,
FELLOW OF TRIN. COL. CAM.
T length, poor fuffering wretch, thy pangs are
o'er,
Death feals thy eyes, and thou shalt groan no more;
No more fhall mifery reach thy tortur'd breast,
Nor life's low cares difturb thy fettled rest:
From pride, ambition, envy, malice free,
Thou feel'ft no more the gripes of penury,
Nor all the thousand pains of fad mortality.
Yet fure fome decent honours to thy fhade,
From learning's fons fome tribute might be paid:
In the laft office might there not have been
Some added grace to folemnize the scene? *
Some plaintive Mufe to deck thy empty bier,
Some pitying friend to drop the tender tear 2
But foes purfued thee to thy latest breath,
And malice left thee not a friend in death.
*The doctor was buried in the college chapel: It is ufual, on the death of any Fellow, to carry an empty bier, with a pall over it, round the Quadrangle, the Choir walking before it, and all the members of the fociety behind: Verses on the deceased are usually fixed to the pall, and thrown into the grave-But these ceremonies were omitted.
One eye alone I faw with forrow flow.
In artless full fimplicity of woe;
The faithful ruftic wept; and only he
Reproach'd the croud for loft humanity.
Defpis'd, unfelt for, unlamented lay,
In the rude grave, th' unanimated clay.
And yet this trampled corse had once a name,
Once was no ftranger to the voice of fame;
This thing defpis'd was once with genius fir'd,
Nay, by the adverfe Bentley was admir'd;
'Midft Granta's fons but lately fill'd the chair,
Graceful, as when her Whalley's felf was there.
Foe to himself alone, his open mind [kind;
Embrac'd, and lov'd, and would have ferv'd man-
But niggard Fortune acts by partial rules,
And oft her bounty showers on knaves and fools;
Once she could fmile on him with glimmering ray,
But clouded o'er the evening of his day;
In life's decline no healing comfort gave,
But funk his foul with forrow to the grave.
By hopes too fanguine led, he met the fate:
Of all who feek the rich, and truft the great.
He went, he bow'd, he heard, and he believ'd;
Was courted, flatter'd, promis'd, — and deceiv'd ;
* A country boy that waited on the Doctor, who was obferved to cry all the time.
Find we then moft to pity or to blame?
Shall we reward with praise, or brand with shame ?
If livelier parts to venial faults betray,
Muft cenfure wipe his merits quite away?
If meagre want, with deep affliction join'd,
Subdue the reason, and unhinge the mind,
Shall we, officious, every blot reveal,
And judge him with uncharitable zeal?
Or kindly weep for Nature thus decay'd,
And o'er his failings caft a friendly fhade;
To future ages bid his virtues bloom,
And bury all his follies in the tomb.
FABLES FOR GROWN GENTLEMEN.
THE RIVER WITH A PETITION.
Ccording to the Romish creed,
I speak of Rome two thousand years ago,
The life that they fuppos'd the Gods to lead,
You would not chufe to undergo.
Jupiter's business, day and night,
Was to attend with open ears and eyes,
And to write down, as fast as he could write,
All the impertinence that men devise.
Befides mens fopperies and ravings,
The women had so great a share,
That their abfurdities and cravings
Omnipotence alone could bear.
And furthermore, to try his patience,
He heard the prayers and fanciful distresses
Of all his children and relations,
And of his wife and his mif-treffes.
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