For living man's fecurity,

Or will enfure our veffel in this faithlefs fea?
Never did the fun as yet

So healthful a fair-day beget,
That travelling mortals might rely on it.

But fortune's favour and her fpite

Roll with alternate wave like day and night: Viciffitudes which thy great race purfue, E'er fince the fatal fon his father flew,

And did old oracles fulfil

Of Gods that cannot lyc, for they foretell but their own will.

Erynnis faw 't, and made in her own feed

The innocent Parricide to bleed;

She flew his wrathful fons with mutual blows:
But better things did then fucceed,

And brave Therfander, in amends for what was paft, arofe.

Brave Therfander was by none,

In war, or warlike fports, out-done.
Thou, Theron, his great virtues doft revive:
He in my veríe and thee again does live.

Load Olympus happy thee,
Ifthmus and Nemea does twice happy fee;
For the well-natur'd honour there,
Which with thy brother thou didst share,
Was to thee double grown
By not being all thine own;
And thofe kind pious glories do deface
The old fraternal quarrel of thy race.

Greatness of mind and fortune too

Th' Olympic trophies fhew:
Both their feveral parts must do

In the noble chace of fame;

This without that is blind, that without this is

lame.

Nor is fair Virtue's picture feen aright

But in Fortune's golden light.

Riches alone are of uncertain date,

And on fhort man long cannot wait; The virtuous make of them the best, And put them out to Fame for intereft;

With a frail good they wifely buy The folid purchase of eternity:

They, whilft life's air they breathe, confider well,

and know

Th' account they muft hereafter give below;
Whereas th' unjuft and covetous above,
In deep unlovely vaults,

By the just decrees of Jove,
Unrelenting torments prove,

The heavy neceffary effects of voluntary faults.
Whilft in the lands of unexhausted light,
O'er which the god-lilcun's unwearied fight

Ne er winks in cleads, or fleeps in night,
An endless fpring of age the good enjoy,
Where neither Want docs pinch, nor Plenty cloy:

There neither earth nor fea they plow,
Nor aught to labour owe

For food, that whilft it nourishes does decay,
And in the lamp of life confumes away.

Thrice had these men through mortal bodies past,

Did thrice the trial undergo,

Till all their little drofs was purg'd at last,
The furnace had no more to do.

Then in rich Saturn's peaceful flate
Were they for facred treafures plac'd,

The Mufc-difcovered world of Islands Fortunate.
Soft-footed winds with tuneful voices there

Dance through the perfum'd air;

There filver rivers through enamel'd meadows glide,

And golden trees enrich their fide;
Th' illuftrious leaves no dropping autumn fear,
And jewels for their fruit they bear,
Which by the bleft are gathered

For bracelets to the arm, and garlands to the head.
Here all the Herocs, and their Poets, live;
Wife Khadamanthus did the fentence give,
Who for his juftice was thought fit

With fovereign Saturn on the bench to fit.
Peleus here, and Cadmus, reign;
Here great Achilles, wrathful now no more,
Since his bleft mother (who before,

Had try'd it on his body' in vain)
Dipt now his foul in Stygian lake,

Which did from thence a divine hardnefs take, That does from paffion and from vice invulnerable make.

To Theron, Mufe! bring back thy wandering fong,

Whom thole bright troops expect impatiently; And may they do fo long!

How, noble archer! do thy wanton arrows fly
At all the game that does but cross thine eye;
Shoot, and fpare not, for I fee

Thy founding quiver can ne'er emptied be.
Let Art ufe method and good-hufbandry,
Art lives on Nature's alms, is weak and poor;
Nature herfelf has unexhaufted flore,
Wallows in wealth, and runs a turning maze,

That no vulgar eye can trace.
Art, inftead of mounting high,

About her humble food does hovering fly;
Like the ignoble crow, rapine and noife does love;
Whilft Nature, like the facred bird of Jove,
Now bears loud thunder; and anon with silent joy
The beauteous Phrygian boy

Defeats the ftrong, o'ertakes the flying prey,
And fometimes bafks in th' open flames of day;
And fometimes too he fhrowds

His foaring wings among the clouds.

Leave, wanton Mufe! thy roving flight;
To thy loud firing the well-fletcht arrow put;
Let Agrigentum be the Butt,

And Theren be the White.

And, left the name of verfe fhould give
Malicious men pretext to misbelieve,
By the Caftalian waters fwear

(A facred oath no poets dare

To take in vain,

No more than Gods do that of Styx prophane),
Swear, in no city e'er before,

A better man, or greater-foul'd, was born;
Swear, that Theron fure has fworn

No man near him fhould be poor;
Swear, that none e'er had fuch a graceful art
Fortune's free gifts as freely to impart,
With an unenvicus hand, and an unbounded heart

How early has young Chromius begun
The race of virtue, and how swiftly run,

And borne the noble prize away,
Whilft other youths yet at the barriers stay!
None but Alcides e'er fet earlier forth than he :
The God, his father's, blood nought could restrain,
'Twas ripe at firft, and did difdain
The flow advance of dull humanity.
The big-limb'd babe in his huge cradle lay,
Too weighty to be rock'd by nurfes' hands,

Wrapt in purple fwadling-bands; When, lo! by jealous Juno's fierce commands, Two dreadful ferpents come, Rolling and hifling loud, into the room;

To the bold babe they trace their bidden way;

Forth from their flaming eyes dread lightnings

went,

Their gaping mouths did forked tongues, like thunder-bolts, prefent.

Some of th' amazed women dropt down dead
With fear, fome wildly fled

About the room, fome into corners crept,

Where filently they fhook and wept : All naked from her bed the paffionate mother leap'd,

To fave or perifh with her child;

She trembled, and the cry'd; the mighty infant fmil'd:

The mighty infant feem'd well pleas'd

At his gay gilded foes;

And, as their fpotted necks up to the cradle rofe,
With his young warlike hands on both he feiz'd;

In vain they rag'd, in vain they hifs'd,
In vain their armed tails they twift,

And angry circles caft about;

Walk with ineffable delight Through the thick groves of never-withering And, as he walks, affright

The lion and the bear,

Bull, centaur, fcorpion, all the radiant mo there.

THE PRAISE OF PINDAR. IN IMITATION OF HORACE'S SECOND ODE,

"Pindarum quifquis ftudet æmulari, &....” The Phoenix Pindar is a vaft fpecies alon DINDAR is imitable by none; Who e'er but Dædalus with waxen wings could And neither fink too low nor foar too high?

What could he who follow'd claim, But of vain boldnefs the unhappy fame, And by his fall a fea to name? Pindar's unnavigable fong

Like a fwoln flood from fome steep moun pours along;

The ocean meets with such a voice, From his enlarged mouth, as drowns the oce noife.

So Pindar does new words and figures roll
Down his impetuous dithyrambic tide,

Which in no channel deigns t' abide,
Which neither banks nor dykes control:
Whether th' immortal Gods he fings,
In a no lefs immortal ftrain,
Or the great acts of God-defcended kings,

he fqueezes out!

With their drawn fwords

In ran Amphitryo and the Theban lords; With doubting wonder, and with troubled joy, They faw the conquering boy

Laugh, and point downwards to his prey, Where, in death's pangs and their own gore, they folding lay..

When wife Tirefias this beginning knew,

He told with cafe the things t' enfue;
From what monsters he fhould free
The earth, the air, and fea;

What mighty tyrants he fhould flay,
Greater monsters far than they;

How much at Phlægra's field the diftreft Gods fhould owe

To their great offspring here below;
And how his club fhould there outdo

Apollo's filver bow, and his own father's thunder

too.

And that the grateful Gods, at last, The race of his laborious virtue paft,

Heaven, which he fav'd, fhould to him give; Where, marry'd to eternal youth, he fhould for ever live;

Drink nectar with the Gods, and all his fenfes pleafe

In their harmonious, golden palaces;

Each rich-embroider'd line, Which their triumphant brows around, By his facred hand is bound, Does all their flarry diadems outfhine. Whether at Pifa's race he please

Whether the fwift, the skilful, or the strong, To carve in polifh'd verfe the conqueror's imagi Be crowned in his nimble, artful, vigorous fon Whether fome brave young man's untimely fate In words worth dying for, he celebrate

Such mournful, and fuch pleafing words, As joy this mother's and his mistress' grie

affords

He bids him live and grow in fame;

Among the ftars he fticks his name; The grave can but the drofs of him devour, So fmall is Death's, fo great the Poet's power! Lo, how th' obfequious wind, and fwelling air,

The Theban fwan does upwards bear Into the walks of clouds, where he does play, And with extended wings open his liquid way! Whilft, alas! my timorous Mufe Unambitious tracks pursues; Does with weak, unballaft wings, About the moffy brooks and fprings, About the trees' new-bloffom'd heads, About the gardens' painted beds,

About the fields and flowery meads,

her And all inferior beauteous things, Like the laborious bee,

For little drops of honey flee,

To mountains they for fhelter pray,

dustry.

When dead t' arife;

And open tombs, and open eyes,

To the long fluggards of five thousand years!
This mightier found fhall make its hearers ears.
Then fhall the fcatter'd atoms crowding come
Back to their ancient home:

Some from birds, from fifhes fome;
Some from earth, and fome from feas;
Some from beafts, and fome from trees;
Some defcend from clouds on high,
Some from metals upwards fly,

And, where th' attending foul naked and shivering ftands,

Meet, falute, and join their hands;

As difpers'd foldiers, at the trumpet's call,
Hafte to their colours all.
Unhappy moft, like tortur'd men,

Their joints new fet, to be new-rack'd again,

THE MUSE.

O, the rich chariot inftantly prepare;

G The Quech, my Mufe, will take the air:
Unruly Fancy with strong Judgment trace;
Put in nimble-footed Wit,

Smooth-pac'd Eloquence join with it;
Sound Memory with young Invention place;
Harnefs all the winged race.

Let the poftillion Nature mount, and let
The coachman Art be fet;

And let the airy footmen, running all befide,
Make a long row of goodly pride,
Figures, Conceits, Raptures, and Sentences,
In a well-worded drefs;

And innocent Loves, and pleafant Truths, and ufeful Lyes,

In all their gaudy liveries.

Mount, glorious Queen! thy travelling throne, And bid it to put on;

For long, though cheerful, is the way,
And life, alas! allows but one ill winter's day.
Where never foot of man, or hoof of beast,

The paffage prefs'd;
Where never fifh did fly,

And with fhort filver wings cut the low liquid fky;
Where bird with painted oars did ne'er
Row through the tracklefs ocean of the air;
Where never yet did pry

The bufy morning's curious eye;

The wheels of thy bold coach pafs quick and free,
And all's an open road to thee!
Whatever God did Say.

Is all thy plain and fmooth uninterrupted way! Nay, ev'n beyond his works thy voyages are known,

Thou 'haft thousand worlds too of thine own. Thou fpeak'ft, great Queen! in the fame ftyle

as He:

And a new world leaps forth when thou fay'ft,

"Let it be."

Thou fathom'it the deep gulf of ages past,

And canft pluck up with ease

The years which thou doft pleafe;

Like fhipwreck'd treasures, by rude tempefts caft

⚫ Long fince into the fea,

But, as in time each great imperial race

Nor doft thou only dive fo low,

But fly

With an unwearied wing the other way on high, Where Fates among the ftars do grow;

There into the clofe nefts of Time doft peep,

And there, with piercing eye,

Through the firm fhell and the thick white, doft fpy

Years to come a-forming lie,

Clofe in their facred fecundine afleep,

Till, hatch'd by the fun's vital heat,

Which o'er them yet does brooding fet,
The life and motion get,

And, ripe at laft, with vigorous might Break through the fhell, and take their everlasting flight!

'Tis fo like truth, 'twill ferve our turn as well.
Juft, as in Nature, thy proportions be,
As full of concord their variety,
As firm the parts upon their centre rest,
And all fo folid are, that they, at leaft
As much as Nature, emptinefs detcit.

Long did the mighty Stagyrite retain
The universal intellectual reign,
Saw his own country's fhort-liv'd leopard flain;
The stronger Roman eagle did out-fly,
Oftener renew'd his age, and faw that die.
Mecca itself, in spite of Mahomet, possest,
And, chac'd by a wild deluge from the East,
His monarchy new planted in the Weft.

So did this noble empire wafte,
Sunk by degrees from glories past,

And in the fchool-men's hands it perish'd quite at laft:

Then nought but words it grew,
And thofe all barbarous too:

It perifh'd, and it vanifh'd there,
The life and foul, breath'd out, became but empty

air!

The fields, which anfwer'd well the ancients' plough,

Spent and out-worn, return no harvest now;
In barren age wild and unglorious lie,
And boast of paft fertility,

The poor relief of prefent poverty.

Food and fruit we now must want,
Unlefs new lands we plant.

We break-up tombs with facrilegious hands;
Old rubbish we remove;

To walk in ruins, like vain ghosts, we love,
And with fond divining wands

We fearch among the dead

For treasures buried:

Whilft ftill the liberal earth does hold

So many virgin-mines of undifcover'd gold.

The Baltic, Euxine, and the Cafpian,
And flender-limb'd Mediterranean,
Seem narrow creeks to thee, and only fit
For the poor wretched fisher-boats of wit:
Thy nobler veffel the vaft ocean trics,

And nothing fees but feas and fkies,
Till unknown regions it defcries,
Thou great Columbus of the golden lands of new
philofophies!

Thy task was harder much than his;
For thy learn'd America is
Not only found-out first by thee,
And rudely left to future industry,

But thy eloquence and thy wit,
Has planted, peopled, built, and civiliz'd, it.

I little thought before

(Nor, being my own felf fo poor, Could comprehend fo vast a store) That all the wardrobe of rich Eloquence Could have afforded half enough, Of bright, of new, and lasting stuff, To cloathe the mighty limbs of thy gigantic fenfe. Thy folid reafon, like the fhield from heaven To the Trojan hero given, Too ftrong to take a mark from any mortal dart, Yet thines with gold and gems in every part, And wonders on it grav'd by the learn'd hand of

Art!

A fhield that gives delight
Ev'n to the enemies' fight,
Then, when they're fure to lofe the combat by 't.

Nor can the fnow, which cold Age does shed
Upon thy reverend head,
Quench or allay the noble fires within:
But all which thou haft been,