DRAWN BY RICHARD WESTALL RA. ENGRAVED BY EDWARD PORTBURY; PUBLISHED BY JOHN SHARPE. PICCADILLY.
THE MAN OF THE WORLD ANSWERED.
THE LOVE OF THIS LIFE; THE AMBITION AND PLEASURE, WITH THE WIT AND WISDOM, OF THE WORLD.
AND has all nature, then, espoused my part?
Have I bribed heaven and earth to plead against thee?
And is thy soul immortal?-What remains?
All, all, LORENZO !-Make immortal bless'd.
Unbless'd immortals!-what can shock us more?
And yet LORENZO still affects the world;
There stows his treasure; thence his title draws,
Man of the world (for such wouldst thou be call'd).
And art thou proud of that inglorious style?
Proud of reproach? for a reproach it was,
In ancient days; and CHRISTIAN,-in an age,
When men were men, and not ashamed of heaven,
Fired their ambition, as it crown'd their joy.
Sprinkled with dews from the Castalian font,
Fain would I rebaptize thee, and confer
A purer spirit and a nobler name.
Thy fond attachments, fatal and inflamed,
Point out my path and dictate to my song:
To thee the world how fair! how strongly strikes
Ambition! and gay pleasure stronger still!
Thy triple bane! the triple bolt, that lays
Thy virtue dead! Be these my triple theme;
Nor shall thy wit or wisdom be forgot.
Common the theme; not so the song; if she
My song invokes, URANIA, deigns to smile.
The charm that chains us to the world, her foe,
If she dissolves, the man of earth, at once,
Starts from his trance, and sighs for other scenes ;
Scenes, where these sparks of night, these stars shall
Unnumber'd suns (for all things, as they are, [shine
The bless'd behold); and, in one glory pour
Their blended blaze on man's astonish'd sight;
A blaze the least illustrious object there.
LORENZO! Since eternal is at hand,
To swallow time's ambitions; as the vast
Leviathan, the bubbles vain, that ride
High on the foaming billow; what avail
High titles, high descent, attainments high,
If unattain❜d our highest? O LORENZO!
What lofty thoughts, these elements above,
What towering hopes, what sallies from the sun,
What grand surveys of destiny divine,
And pompous presage of unfathom'd fate,
Should roll in bosoms where a spirit burns
Bound for Eternity! in bosoms read
By Him who foibles in archangels sees!
On human hearts He bends a jealous eye,
And marks, and in heaven's register inrolls,
The rise and progress of each option there;
Sacred to doomsday! That the page unfolds,
And spreads us to the gaze of gods and men.
And what an option, O LORENZO! thine!
This world! and this unrival'd by the skies!
A world, where lust of pleasure, grandeur, gold,
Three demons that divide its realms between them,
With strokes alternate buffet to and fro
Man's restless heart, their sport, their flying ball;
Till, with the giddy circle sick and tired,
It pants for peace, and drops into despair.
Such is the world LORENZO sets above
That glorious promise angels were esteem'd
Too mean to bring; a promise, their Adored
Descended to communicate, and press,
By counsel, miracle, life, death, on man.
Such is the world LORENZO's wisdom woos,
And on its thorny pillow seeks repose;
A pillow, which, like opiates ill prepared,
Intoxicates, but not composes; fills
The visionary mind with gay chimeras,
All the wild trash of sleep, without the rest;
What unfeign'd travel, and what dreams of joy!
How frail, men, things! How momentary, both!
Fantastic chase of shadows hunting shades!
The gay, the busy, equal, though unlike;
Equal in wisdom, differently wise!
Through flowery meadows and through dreary wastes
One bustling, and one dancing, into death.
There's not a day, but, to the man of thought,
Betrays some secret that throws new reproach
On life, and makes him sick of seeing more.
The scenes of business tell us-" What are men;"
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