Heav'n ne'er, in mercy to the wretched, gave While scarce the wretch he freed from anguish found He foremost stood, and led the thickest fight. It lives recorded in his Country's praise. Thou, gen'rous Youth, thy Father's fame must hear, ON READING "THE LIFE OF THOMAS PAINE, Staymaker, Grocer, Swindler, Exciseman, Tobacconist, &c. &c. and author of The Rights of Man.” 1791. O, fam'd to uphold by needle and by pen The shapes of Women, and the rights of Men! Exciseman, Grocer, or Tobacconist; What tongue your many-colour'd life can trace? What eye pursue you your lawless race? thro' your Hence urg'd by swindling penury to fly, You seek fresh troubles in the Western sky; There all the ties of civil life unbind, And mar the social compact of mankind, Till gen'rous FRANKLIN spurns your proffer'd aid, And your base labours are with scorn repaid. Next Next France receives you on her stormy coast, From your own hearth you light Alecto's brand, In vain-the fit of mad'ning rage is o'er, And Peace and Freedom guard this favour'd Shore. And owes some great example to mankind. HYMN TO CHARITY. HERE Virtue fixes her eternal shrine, On Truth its firm foundations stand, Hope bids the lofty structure rise And rears its stately columns to the skies: O Charity, that gives it to endure Had I an angel's ever-tuneful tongue, Sacred, my unpremeditated song; Else were the raptures of my heav'nly strain But as a tinkling cymbal vain. Could I with Reason's more enlighten'd beam, Nature through all her various works descry, And yet to Charity were blind; My knowledge would but perish as a dream, Each art at length shall stoop its tow'ring wing, With drooping head fair Science shall decline; But thou, O Charity, That flow'st from Virtue's unexhausted spring, Eternal, and of origin divine, Thou only shalt be free From the hard laws of frail mortality. High as the Heav'n of Heav'ns thy throne is rais'd, When thou, the first of that celestial throng, By loud angelic trump art prais'd, Immortal theme of their triumphant song; Yet |