HOPE.

-doceas iter, et sacra ostea pandas.
VIRG. En. 6.

ASK what is human life-the sage replies,
With disappointment low'ring in his eyes,
A painful passage o'er a restless flood;
A vain pursuit of fugitive false good;
A scene of fancied bliss and heart-felt care,
Closing at last in darkness and despair.
The poor, inur'd to drudg'ry and distress,
Act without aim, think little, and feel less,
And no where, but in feign'd Arcadian scenes,
Taste happiness, or know what pleasure means.
Riches are pass'd away from hand to hand,

As fortune, vice, or foily may command;

As in a dance, the pair that take the lead

So shifting and so various is the plan,

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Turn downward, and the lowest pair succeed,

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By which Heav'n rules the mix'd affairs of man ;
Vicissitude wheels round the motley crowd,

The rich grow poor, the poor become purse-proud;
Business is labour, and man's weakness such,

Pleasure is labour too, and tires as much.

The very sense of it foregoes its use,

By repetition pall'd, by age obtuse.

fouth lost in dissipation, we deplore,

Through life's sad remnant, what no sighs restore :
VOL. I.

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Our years a fruitless race without a prize,
Too many, yet too few to make us wise.

Dangling his cane about, and taking snuff,
Lothario cries, What philosophick stuff-

O querulous and weak!—whose useless brain

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Once thought of nothing, and now thinks in vain; 30
Whose eye reverted weeps o'er all the past,
Whose prospect shows thee a disheart'ning waste:
Would age in thee resign his wintry reign,
And youth invigorate that frame again,
Renew'd desire would grace with other speech
Joys always priz'd, when plac'd within our reach.
For, lift thy palsied head, shake off the gloom
That overhangs the borders of thy tomb,
See Nature gay as when she first began,
With smiles alluring her admirer man ;

She spreads the morning over eastern hills,
Earth glitters with the drops the night distils;
The sun, obedient at her call, appears,

To fling his glories o'er the robe she wears;

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Banks cloth'd with flow'rs, groves fill'd with sprightly

sounds,

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The yellow tilth, green meads, rocks, rising grounds, Streams edg'd with osiers, fatt'ning ev'ry field, Where'er they flow, now seen, and now conceal'd; From the blue rim, where skies and mountains meet, Down to the very turf beneath thy feet,

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Ten thousand charms, that only fools despise,

Or Pride can look at with indiff'rent eyes,

All speak one language, all with one sweet voice

The wretch may pine, while to his smell, taste, sight, She holds a paradise of rich delight;

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But gently to rebuke his awkward fear,

To prove that what she gives, she gives sincero.
To banish hesitation, and proclaim

His happiness, her dear, her only aim.

"Tis grave philosophy's absurdest dream,
That Heav'n's intentions are not what they seem
That only shadows are dispens'd below,
And earth has no reality but wo.

Thus things terrestrial wear a different hue, As youth or age persuades; and neither true.

So Flora's wreath through colour'd crystal seen,
The rose or lily appears blue or green,
But still th' imputed tints are those alone

The medium represents, and not their own.

To rise at noon, sit slipshod and undress'd,

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To read the news or fiddle as seems best,

Till half the world comes rattling at his door,

To fill the dull vacuity till four;

And, just when ev'ning turns the blue vault gray,
To spend two hours in dressing for the day:
To make the Sun a bauble without use,
Save for the fruits his heav'nly beams produce:
Quite to forget, or deem it worth no thought,
Who bids him shine, or if he shine or not;

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Through mere necessity to close his eyes

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Just when the larks and when the shepherds rise:

Is such a life, so tediously the same,

So void of all utility or aim,

That poor Jonquil, with almost ev'ry breath,

Sighs for his exit, vulgarly call'd death:

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For he, with all his follies, has a mind
Not yet so blank, or fashionably blind,

But now and then perhaps a feeble ray

Of distant wisdom shoots across his way;

By which he reads, that life without a plan,
As useless as the moment it began,

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Serves merely as a soil for discontent

To thrive in ; an incumbrance ere half spent.

O weariness beyond what asses feel,

That tread the circuit of the cistern wheel;

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A dull rotation, never at a stay,

Yesterday's face twin image of to-day ;-
While conversation, an exhausted stock,
Grows drowsy as the clicking of a clock.
No need he cries, of gravity stuff'd out
With academick dignity devout,
To read wise lectures, vanity the text ;
Proclaim the remedy, ye learned, next;
For truth self-evident, with pomp impress'd,
Is vanity surpassing all the rest.

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That remedy, not hid in deeps profound, Yet seldom sought where only to be found, While passion turns aside from its due scope Th' inquirer's aim, that remedy is hope.

Life is his gift, from whom whate'er life needs,

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With ev'ry good and perfect gift proceeds;
Bestow'd on man, like all that we partake,
Royally, freely, for his bounty's sake;
Transient indeed, as is the fleeting hour,
And yet the seed of an immortal flow'r ;
Design'd in honour of his endless love,
To fill with fragance his abode above;
No trifle, howsoever short it seem,
And howsoever shadowy, no dream;

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Its value what no thought can ascertain,

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Nor all an angel's eloquence explain.

Men deal with life as children with their play,

Who first misuse, then cast their toys away;

Live to no sober purpose, and contend

That their Creator had no serious end.

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When God and man stand opposite in view,

Man's disappointment must of course ensue.
The just Creator condescends to write,
In beams of inextinguishable light,

His names of wisdom, goodness, pow'r, and love,
On all that blooms below, or shines above;

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To catch the wand'ring notice of mankind,
And teach the world, if not perversely Llind,
His gracious attributes, and prove the share
His offspring hold in his paternal care.
If, led from earthly things to things divine,
His creature thwart not his august design,
Then praise is heard instead of reas'ning pride,
And captious cavil and complaint subside.
Nature employ'd in her allotted place,

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Is handmaid to the purposes of Grace;

By good vouchsaf'd makes known superiour good,

And bliss not seen by blessings understood:

That bliss, reveal'd in Scripture, with a glow

Bright as the covenant ensuring bow,

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Fires all his feelings with a noble scorn

Of sensual evil, and thus hope is born.

Hope sets the stamp of vanity on all

That men have deem'd substantial since the fall;
Yet has the wondrous virtue to educe

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From emptiness itself a real use;

And while she takes, as at a father's hand,
What health and sober appetite demand,

From fading good derives, with chemick art,

That lasting happiness, a thankful heart.

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Hope with uplifted foot, set free from earth,

Pants for the place of her ethereal birth,

On steady wings sails through the immense abyss,

Plucks amaranthine joys from bowers of bliss,

And crowns the soul, while yet a mourner here

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With wreaths like those triumphant spirits wear.

Hope, as an anchor firm and sure, holds fast

The Christian vessel, and defies the blast.
Hope! nothing else can nourish and secure
His new-born virtues, and preserve him pure.

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Hope! let the wretch, once conscious of the joy,
Whom now despairing agonies destroy,
Speak, for he can, and none so well as he,
What treasures centre, what delights in thee