8. And now, that bold and hardy few
Are a nation wide and strong;

And danger and doubt I have led them through,
And they worship me in song;

And over their bright and glancing arms,
On field, and lake, and sea,

With an eye that fires, and a spell that charms,
I guide them to victory!"

PERCIVAL

LESSON CCXXVII.

ROME.

1. THE Niobe of nations! there she stands,
Childless and crownless, in her voiceless woe;
An empty urn within her withered hands,
Whose holy dust was scattered long ago;
The Scipios' tomb contains no ashes now;
The very sepulchers are tenantless

Of their heroic dwellers; dost thou flow,
Old Tiber! through a marble wilderness?

Rise, with thy yellow waves, and mantle her distress?

2. The Goth, the Christian, Time, War, Flood, and Fire, Have dealt upon the seven-hilled city's pride;

She saw her glories, star by star, expire,
And up the steep, barbarian monarchs ride

Where the car climbed the capitol; far and wide

Temple and tower went down, nor left a site:
Chaos of ruins! who shall trace the void,

O'er the dim fragments cast a lunar light,

And say, "here was, or is," where all is doubly night?

3. The double night of ages, and of her,

Night' da ighter, ignorance, hath wrapt and wrap
All round us; we but feel our way to err:
The ocean hath his chart, the stars their map,
And knowledge spreads them on her ample lap;
But Rome is as the desert, where we steer
Stumbling o'er recollections; now we clap
Our hands, and cry, "Eureka!" it is clear;
When but some false mirage of ruin rises near.

4 Alas! the lofty city! and alas!

The trebly hundred triumphs! and the day
When Brutus made the dagger's edge surpass
The conqueror's sword in bearing fame away!
Alas, for Tully's voice, and Virgil's lay,
And Livy's pictured page! But these shall be
Her resurrection; all boside, decay.

Alas, for earth! for never shall we see

That brightness in her eye she bore, when Rome was free.

5 There is a moral of all human tales;

"Tis but the same rehearsal of the past:

First, freedom, and then, glory; when that fails,
Wealth, vice, corruption; barbarism at last;
And history, with all her volumes vast,
Hath but one page,-'tis better written here,
Where gorgeous tyranny had thus amassed
All treasures, all delights, that eye, or ear,

Heart, soul could seek, tongue ask-away with words! draw near,

6. Admire, exult, despise, laugh, weep; for here,
There is much matter for all feeling. Man!
Thou pendulum betwixt a smile and tear!
Ages and realms are crowded in this span,
This mountain, whose obliterated plan
The pyramid of empires pinnacled,

Of glory's gew-gaws shining in the van,

Till the sun's rays with added flame were filled!

Where are its golden roofs? Where those who dared to build?

7. Tully was not so eloquent as thou,

Thou nameless column, with the buried base!
What are the laurels of the Cesar's brow?
Crown me with ivy from his dwelling place.
Whose arch or pillar meets me in the face?
Titus', or Trajan's? No! 'tis that of Time:
Triumph, arch, pillar, all he doth displace,
Scoffing; and apostolic statues climb

To crush the imperial urn,* whose ashes slept sublime.

BYRON.

1. WHEN I am in a serious humor, I very often walk by myself in Westminster Abbey, where the gloominess of the place, and the use to which it is applied, with the solemnity of the building, and the condition of the people who lie in it, are apt to fill the mind with a kind of melancholy, or rather thoughtfulness, that is not disagreeable. I yesterday passed the whole afternoon in the church-yard, the cloisters, and the church, amusing myself with the tomb-stones and inscriptions that I met with in those several regions of the dead. Most of them recorded nothing else of the

* Trajan's.

buried person, but that he was born upon one day, and died upon another; the whole history of his life being comprehended in those two circumstances, that are common to all mankind. I could not but look upon these registers of existence, whether of brass or marble, as a kind of satire upon the departed persons, who had left no other memorial of them, but that they were born, and that they died.

2. Upon my going into the church, I entertained myself with the digging of a grave, and saw in every shovelfull of it that was thrown up, the fragment of a bone or skull, intermixed with a kind of fresh, moldering earth, that, sometime or other, had a place in the composition of a human body. Upon this, I began to consider with myself, what innumerable multitudes of people lay confused together under the pavement of that ancient cathedral; how men and women, friends and enemies, priests and soldiers, monks and prebendaries, were crumbled among one another, and blended together in the same common mass; how beauty, strength, and youth, with old age, weakness, and deformity, lay undistinguished in the same promiscuous heap of matter.

3. After having thus surveyed this magazine of mortality, as it were in the lump, I examined it more particularly, by the accounts which I found on several of the monuments, which are raised in every quarter of that ancient fabric. Some of them were covered with such extravagant epitaphs, that if it were possible for the dead person to be acquainted with them, he would blush at the praises which his friends have bestowed upon him. There are others so excessively modest, that they deliver the character of the person departed, in Greek or Hebrew, and, by that means, are not understood once in a twelvemonth. In the poetical quarter I found there were poets who had no monuments, and monuments which had no poets. I observed, indeed, that the present war had filled the church with many of those uninhabited monuments, which had been erected to the memory of persons, whose bodies were, perhaps, buried in the plains of Blenheim, or in the bosom of the ocean.

4. I know, that entertainments of this nature are apt to raise dark and dismal thoughts in timorous minds and gloomy imaginations; but, for my own part, though I am always serious, I do not know what it is to be melancholy; and can, therefore, take a view of nature in her deep and solemn scenes, with the same pleasure, as in her most gay and delightful ones. By this means, I can improve myself with those objects, which others consider with terror.

5. When I look upon the tombs of the great, every emotion of envy dies in me; when I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every

inordinate desire goes out; when I meet with the grief of parents upon a tombstone, my heart melts with compassion; when I see the tomb of the parents themselves, I consider the vanity of grieving for them, whom we must quickly follow; when I see kings lying by those who deposed them, when I see rival wits lying side by side, or holy men that divided the world by their contests and disputes, I reflect, with sorrow and astonishment, on the little competitions, factions, and debates of mankind. When I read the several dates of the tombs, of some that died yesterday, some, six hundred years ago, I consider that great day when we shall all of us be cotemporaries, and make our appearance together.

ADDISON

LESSON CCXXIX.

THE THREE WARNINGS.

1. THE tree of deepest root is found
Least willing still to quit the ground;
"T was therefore said, by ancient sages,
That love of life increased with years,
So much, that in our latter stages,
When pains grow sharp and sickness rages,
The greatest love of life appears.

This great affection to believe,
Which all confess, but few perceive,
If old assertions can't prevail,
Be pleased to hear a modern tale.

2. When sports went round, and all were gay,
On neighbor Dobson's wedding-day;
Death called aside the jocund groom
With him into another room;

And looking grave, "You must," says he,
"Quit your sweet bride, and come with me."
"With you! and quit my Susan's side?
With you ?" the hapless bridegroom cried :
"Young as I am, 't is monstrous hard!
Besides, in truth, I'm not prepared.”

3. What more he urged, I have not heard;
His reasons could not well be stronger:
So Death the poor delinquent spared,
And left to live a little longer.

Yet calling up a serious look,

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His hour-glass trembled, while he spoke ;
Neighbor," he said, "farewell; no more
Shall Death disturb your mirthful hour,

And further, to avoid all blame
Of cruelty upon my name,
To give you time for preparation,
And fit you for your future station,
Three several warnings you shall have,
Before you 're summoned to the grave:
Willing, for once, I'll quit my prey,
And grant a kind reprieve ;

In hopes you'll have no more to say,
But when I call again this way,

Well pleased the world will leave."
To these conditions both consented,
And parted perfectly contented.

4. What next the hero of our tale befell,
How long he lived, how wise, how well,
It boots not, that the muse should tell;
He plowed, he sowed, he bought, he sold,
Nor once perceived his growing old,
Nor thought of Death as near;
His friends not false, his wife no shrew,
Many his gains, his children few,
He passed his hours in peace:

But, while he viewed his wealth increase,
While thus along life's dusty road,
The beaten track, content, he trod,
Old Time, whose haste no mortal spares,
Uncalled, unheeded, unawares,

Brought on his eightieth year.

5. And now, one night, in musing mood
As all alone he sat,

The unwelcome messenger of Fate
Once more before him stood.

Half killed with wonder and surprise,
"So soon returned!" old Dobson cries.
"So soon, d 'ye call it?" Death replies :

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Surely, my friend, you 're but in jest ;
Since I was here before,

"T is six-and-thirty years at least,

And you are now four-score."

"So much the worse!" the clown rejoined ;

"To spare the aged would be kind :

Besides, you promised me three warnings,
Which I have looked for, nights and mornings!"

6. "I know," cries Death, "that, at the best,
I seldom am a welcome guest;
But do n't be captious, friend; at least,
I little thought you'd still be able
To stump about your farm and stable;
Your years have run to a great length,
Yet still you seem to have your strength."