Touch'd by your hand, his manly frame improves 65
With grace divine, and like a god he moves.
Ev'n I, the meaneft of the Mufe's train,
Inflam'd by thee, attempt a nobler strain;
Advent'rous waken the Mæonian lyre,
Tun'd by your hand, and fing as you infpire:
So arm'd by great Achilles for the fight,
Patroclus conquer'd in Achilles right:
Like theirs, our friendship! and I boaft my name
To thine united-for thy friendship's fame.
This labour paft, of heav'nly fubjects fing,
While hov'ring angels liften on the wing.
To hear from earth fuch heart-felt raptures rife,
As, when they fing, fufpended hold the kies:
Or nobly rifing in fair Virtue's caufe,
From thy own life tranfcribe th' unerring laws;
Teach a bad world beneath her fway to bend:
To verfe like thine fierce favages attend,
And men more fierce: when Orpheus tunes the lay,
Ev'n fiends relenting hear their rage away.
On the publishing his WORKS.
HE comes, he comes! bid ev'ry bard prepare
The fong of triumph, and attend his car.
Great Sheffield's Mufe the long proceffion heads,
And throws a luftre o'er the pomp fhe leads,
Firft gives the palm fhe fir'd him to obtain,
Crowns his gay brow, and fhews him how to reign.
Thus young Alcides, by old Chiron taught,
Was form'd for all the miracles he wrought:
Thus Chiron did the youth he taught applaud,
Pleas'd to behold the earneft of a god.
But hark, what fhouts, what gath'ring crouds rejoice!
Unftain'd their praise by any venal voice,
Such as the ambitious vainly think their due,
When proftitutes, or needy flatt'rers fue.
And fee the chief! before him laurels borne ;
Trophies from undeferving temples torn;
Here rage enchain'd reluctant raves, and there
Pale envy dumb, and fick'ning with despair,
Prone to the earth fhe bends her loathing eye,
Weak to fupport the blaze of majesty.
But what are they that turn the facred page
Three lovely virgins, and of equal age';
Intent they read, and all enamour'd seem,
As he that met his likeness in the stream:
The GRACES these; and fee how they contend,
Who moft shall praife, who beft fhall recommend.
The chariot now the painful fteep afcends,
The Peans ceafe; thy glorious labour ends.
Here fix'd, the bright eternal temple ftands,
Its profpect an unbounded view commands:
Say, wond'rous youth, what column wilt thou chufe,
What laurel'd arch for thy triumphant Muse?
Tho' each great ancient court thee to his fhrine,
Tho' ev'ry laurel thro' the dome be thine,
(From the proud Epic, down to thofe that shade
The gentler Brow of the foft Lesbian maid)
Go to the good and juft, an awful train,
Thy foul's delight, and glory of the fane:
While thro' the earth thy dear remembrance flies,
"Sweet to the world, and grateful to the skies."
MMORTAL bard! for whom each Mufe has wove
The fairest garlands of th' Aonian grove; c33 234
Preferv'd, our drooping genius to reftore,
When Addison and Congreve are no more;
After fo many ftars extinct in night,
The dark'ned ages laft remaining light!
To thee from Latian realms this verfe is writ,
Infpir'd by memory of ancient wit;
For now no more these climes their influence boaft,
Fall'n is their glory, and their virtue loft;. *-
From tyrants, and from priefts, the Mufes fly, bant Daughters of Reason and of Liberty.
Nor Baiæ now, nor Umbria's plain they love,
Nor on the banks of Nar, or Mincia rove;
To Thames's flow'ry borders they retire,
And kindle in thy breaft the Roman fire.
So in the fhades, when cheat'd with fummer rays
Melodious linnets warbled sprightly lays,
Soon as the faded, falling leaves complain
Of gloomy winter's unaufpicious reign,
No tuneful voice is heard of joy or love,
But mournful filence faddens all the
Unhappy Italy! whofe alter'd ftate
Has felt the worst feverity of fate:
Not that barbarian hands her fafces broke,
And bow'd her haughty neck beneath their yoke;
Nor that her palaces to earth are thrown,
Her cities defert, and her fields unfown;
But that her ancient fpirit is decay'd,
That facred wifdom from her bounds is fled,
That there the fource of fcience flows no more,
Whence its rich ftreams fupply'd the world before.
Illuftrious names! that once in Latium fhin'd,
Born to inftruct, and to command mankind;
Chiefs, by whose virtue mighty Rome was rais'd,
And poets, who thofe chiefs fublimely prais'd!
Oft I the traces you have left explore,
Your afhes vifit, and your urns adore ;)
Oft kifs, with lips devout, fome mould'ring ftone,
With ivy's venerable fhade o'ergrown;
Those hallow'd ruins better pleas'd to fee
Than all the pomp of modern luxury.
As late on Virgil's tomb fresh flow'rs I ftrow'd,
While with th' infpiring Mufe my bofom glow'd,
Crown'd with eternal bays my ravish'd eyes
Beheld the poet's awful form arise :
Stranger, he faid, whofe pious hand has paid
Thefe grateful rites to my attentive shade,
When thou shalt breathe thy happy native air,
To Pope this meffage from his master bear:
Great bard, whofe numbers I myself inspire,
To whom I gave my own harmonious lyre,
If high exalted on the throne of wit,
Near me and Homer thou afpire to fit,
No more let meaner fatire dim the
That flow majeftic from thy nobler bays;
In all the flow'ry paths of Pindus stray,
But fhun that thorny, that unpleafing way;
Nor, when each soft engaging Muse is thine,
Addrefs the least attractive of the Nine.
Of thee more worthy were the task, to raise
A lafting column to thy country's praise,
To fing the land, which yet alone can boast
That liberty corrupted Rome has loft;
Where science in the arms of peace is laid,
And plants her palm beneath the olive's fhade.
Such was the theme' for which my lyre I ftrung,
Such was the people whofe exploits I fung;
Brave, yet refin'd, for arms and arts renown'd,
With diff'rent bays by Mars and Phoebus crown'd, mm 70
Dauntless oppofers of tyrannic sway,
But pleas'd, a mild: AUGUSTUS to obey.
If these commands fubmiffive thou receive, 100 Immortal and unblam'd thy name fhall live;efe Envy to black Cocytus fhall retire,
And howl with furies in tormenting fire;
Approving time fhall confecrate thy days, no trod And join the patriot's to the poet's praises al unit'?'
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