In weakness safe, the fex I fee
With idle luftre shine;

For what are all their joys to me,
Which cannot now be mine?

But hold--I feel my gout decrease,

My troubles laid to rest,
And truths which wou'd difturb my peace
Are painful truths at beft,

Vainly the time I have to roll
In fad reflection flies ;
Ye fondling paffions of my foul!
Ye sweet deceits! arife.

I wifely change the scene within,

To things that us'd to please,

A NIGHT-PIECE on DEATH.

Y the blue taper's trembling light,

No more I waste the wakeful night,
Intent with endless view to pore
The schoolmen and the fages o'er :
Their books from wifdom widely ftray,

Or point at best the longest way.
I'll seek a readier path, and go
Where wisdom's furely taught below.

B

How deep yon azure dies the sky!
Where orbs of gold unnumber'd lye,
While thro' their ranks in filver pride
The nether crefcent feems to glide.
The flumb'ring breeze forgets to breathe,
The lake is smooth and clear beneath,
Where once again the spangled show
Descends to meet our eyes below.
The grounds which on the right afpire,
In dimnefs from the view retire :

The left presents a place of graves,
Whose wall the filent water laves.
That steeple guides thy doubtful fight
Among the livid gleams of night.
There pass with melancholy state,
By all the folemn heaps of fate,
And think, as foftly-fad you tread
Above the venerable dead,

Time was, like thee they life poffeft,
And time fhall be, that thou shalt reft.

Those graves, with bending Ofier bound,.
That nameless heave the crumbled ground,
Quick to the glancing thought disclose,
Where toil and poverty repose.

The flat smooth ftones that bear a name,
The chiffel's flender help to fame,
(Which ere our fet of friends decay.
Their frequent steps may wear away ;)
A middle race of mortals own,

Men, half ambitious, all unknown..

G 5

The

The marble tombs that rife on high,
Whose dead in vaulted arches lye,
Whofe pillars fwell with fculptur'd stones,
Arms, angels, epitaphs, and bones,
Thefe, all the poor remains of state,
Adorn the rich, or praise the great;
Who while on earth in fame they live,
Are fenfeless of the fame they give.

Ha! while I gaze, pale Cynthia fades,
The bursting earth unveils the shades!
All flow, and wan, and wrap'd with shrouds,
They rife in vifionary crouds,

And all with fober accent cry,
Think, mortal, what it is to dye.

Now from yon black and fun'ral yew,
That bathes the charnel-houfe with dew,
Methinks, I hear a voice begin;

(Ye ravens, ceafe your croaking din, Ye tolling clocks, no time refound

O'er the long lake and midnight ground)

It

It fends a peal of hollow groans,
Thus fpeaking from among the bones..
When men my scythe and darts supply,
How great a King of Fears am I !

They view me like the laft of things;
They make, and then they dread my ftings.
Fools! if you lefs provok'd your fears,
No more my spectre-form appears.
Death's but a path that must be trod,
If man wou'd ever pass to God:
A port of calms, a state of eafe
From the rough rage of fwelling feas,,

Why then thy flowing fable stoles,
Deep pendent cypress, mourning poles,
Loose scarfs to fall athwart thy weeds,
Long palls, drawn herfes, cover'd steeds,
And plumes of black, that as they tread,
Nod o'er the 'fcutcheons of the dead?

Nor can the parted body know,
Nor wants the foul, these forms of woe:

As