III. 3.

'The verse adorn again,

Fierce War, and faithful Love,
And Truth severe, by fairy Fiction dress'd.
In buskin'd measures move 27
Pale Grief, and pleasing Pain,

With Horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast.
A voice, as of the cherub-choir,28

Gales from blooming Eden bear:

And distant warblings lessen on my ear, 29

That lost in long futurity expire.

Fond, impious Man, think'st thou yon sanguine cloud,

Raised by thy breath, has quench'd the orb of day? To-morrow he repairs the golden flood,

And warms the nations with redoubled ray. Enough for me: with joy I see

The different doom our fates assign. Be thine Despair, and sceptred Care, To triumph, and to die, are mine.'

He spoke; and headlong from the mountain's height Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night.

27 Shakspeare.

28 Milton.

29 The succession of poets after Milton's time.

BEATTIE.

THE MINSTREL.

BOOK I.