Yet to say truth, e'en here the Muse disdains
Confinement, and attempts her former strains,
But finds the strong desire is not the pow'r,
And what her taste condemns, the flames devour.
A part, perhaps, like this, escapes the doom,
And tho' unworthy, finds a friend at Rome.
But oh the cruel art, that could undo
Its vot'ry thus, would that could perish too.
WHICH HAPPENED IN JANUARY, 1799.
WHERE Humber pours his rich commercial stream, There dwelt a wretch who breath'd but to blaspheme In subterraneous caves his life he led,
Black as the mine in which he wrought for bread.
When on a day emerging from the deep,
A sabbath-day, (such sabbaths thousands keep!)
The wages of his weekly toil he bore
To buy a cock-whose blood might win him more ·
As if the noblest of the feather'd kind
Were but for battle and for death design'd;
As if the consecrated hours were meant
For sport, to minds on cruelty intent;
It chanc'd (such chances Providence obey)
He met a fellow-lab'rer on the way,
Whose heart the same desires had once inflam'd ;
But now the savage temper was reclaim'd.
Persuasion on his lips had taken place;
For all plead well, who plead the cause of grace.
His iron-heart with scripture he assail'd,
Woo'd him to hear a sermon, and prevail'd
His faithful bow the mighty preacher drew,
Swift, as the lightning-glimpse, the arrow flew.
He wept; he trembled; cast his eyes around,
To find a worse than he; but none he found.
He felt his sins, and wonder'd he should feel,
Grace made the wound, and grace alone could heal.
Now farewell oaths, and blasphemies, and lies!
He quits the sinner's for the martyr's prize.
That holy day which wash'd with many a tear,
Gilded with hope, yet shaded too by fear.
The next, his swarthy brethren of the mine
Learn'd, by his alter'd speech--the change divine! Laugh'd when they should have wept, and swore the
Was nigh, when he would swear as fast as they.
No, (said the penitent,) such words shall share
This breath no more; devoted now to pray'r.
O! if thou see'st (thine eye the future sees)
That I shall yet again blaspheme like these;
Now strike me to the ground on which I kneel,
Ere yet this heart relapses into steel;
Now take me to that Heaven I once defied,
Thy presence, thy embrace !"-He spoke and died
VOL. III.
"So when, from mountain tops, the dusky clouds "Ascending, &c.”
Quales aerii montis de vertice nubes
Cum surgunt, et jam Boreæ tumida ora quierunt,
Cœlum hilares abdit, spissa caligine, vultus:
Tum si jucundo tandem sol prodeat ore,
Et croceo montes et pascua lumine tingat,
Gaudent omnia, aves mulcent concentibus agros,
Balatuque ovium colles vallesque resultant.
DRYDEN'S EPIGRAM ON MILTON
"Three Poets, in three distant ages born, &c'
TRES tria, sed longe distantia, sæcula vates
Ostentant tribus e gentibus eximios
Græcia sublimem, cum majestate disertum
Roma tulit, felix Anglia utrique parem.
Partubus ex binis Natura exhausta, coacta est,
Tertius ut fieret, consociare duos.
ON HIS RETURN FROM RAMSGATE.
THAT Ocean you have late survey'd,
Those rocks I too have seen,
But I afflicted and dismay'd,
You tranquil and serene.
You from the flood-controlling steep
Saw stretch'd before your view,
With conscious joy, the threat'ning deep,
No longer such to you.
To me, the waves that ceaseless broke
Upon the dang'rous coast,
Hoarsely and ominously spoke
Of all my treasure lost.
Your sea of troubles you have past,
And found the peaceful shore ;
I, tempest toss'd, and wreck'd at last,
Come home to port no more.
WHAT is there in the vale of life
Half so delightful as a wife,
When friendship, love, and peace combine
To stamp the marriage bond divine?
The stream of pure and geniune love
Derives its current from above;
And earth a second Eden shows,
Where'er the healing water flows;
But ah, if from the dykes and drains
Of sensual nature's fev'rish veins,
Lust, like a lawless headstrong flood,
Impregnated with ooze and mud,
Descending fast on every side,
Once mingles with the sacred tide,
Farewell the soul-enliv'ning scene!
The banks that wore a smiling green,
With rank defilement overspread,
Bewail their flow'ry beauties dead.
The stream polluted, dark, and dull,
Diffus'd into a Stygian pool,
Through life's last melancholy years
Is fed with overflowing tears:
Complaints supply the zephyr's part,
And sighs that heave a breaking heart.
A POETICAL EPISTLE TO LADY
DEAR ANNA-between friend and friend,
Prose answers every common end;
Serves, in a plain and homely way,
T'express th' occurrence of the day;
Our health, the weather, and the news; What walks we take, what books we choose,
And all the floating thoughts we find
Upon the surface of the mind.
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