So in the prifm to the deluded eye

Each pictur❜d trifle takes a rainbow dye,

With borrow'd charms the fhining profpect glows,

And truth revers'd the faithlefs mirror fhows,
Inverted scenes in bright confusion lie,

The lawns impending o'er the nether sky;
No juft, no real images we meet,

But all the gaudy vision is deceit.

Oft I revolve in this distracted mind

Each word, each look, that spoke my charmer kind;
But oh! how dear their memory I pay !

What pleasures past can present cares allay?
Of all I love for ever difpoffefs'd:

Ah! what avails to think I once was blefs'd?
Hard difpofition of unequal fate!

Mix'd are our joys, and tranfient are their date;

Nor can reflection bring them back again,
Yet brings an after-fting to every pain.

Thy fatal letters, oh immoral youth,

Those perjur'd pledges of fictitious truth,
Dear as they were no fecond joy afford,

My cred❜lous heart once leap'd at every word,

My glowing bofom throbb'd with thick-heav'd fighs, And floods of rapture gush'd into my eyes:

When .

When now repeated (for thy theft was vain,
Each treasur'd fyllable my thoughts retain)
Far other paffions rule, and diff'rent care,
My joys and grief, my transports and despair.

Why doft thou mock the ties of constant love?
But half its joys the faithless ever prove,
They only taste the pleasures they receive,
When fure the nobleft is in those we give.
Acceptance is the heav'n which mortals know,
But 'tis the blifs of angels to beftow.

Oh! emulate, my love, that task divine,
Be thou that angel, and that heav'n be mine.
Yet, yet relent, yet intercept my fate:
Alas! I rave, and fue for new deceit.
As foon the dead fhall from the grave return,
As love extinguish'd with new ardor burn.
Oh! that I dar'd to act a Roman part,
And ftab thy image in this faithful heart,
Where riveted for life fecure you reign,
A cruel inmate, author of my pain:
But coward-like irrefolute I wait
Time's tardy aid, nor dare to rush on fate;
Perhaps may linger on life's latest stage,
Survive thy cruelties, and fall by age:

No

No-grief fhall fwell my fails, and speed me o'er (Despair my pilot) to that quiet shore

Where I can truft, and thou betray no more.
Might I but once again behold thy charms,
Might I but breathe my last in those dear arms,
On that lov'd face but fix my closing eye,
Permitted where I might not live to die,
My foften❜d fate I would accuse no more;
But fate has no fuch happiness in store.

'Tis past, 'tis done-what gleam of hope behind,
When I can ne'er be false, nor thou be kind?
Why then this care ?—'tis weak-'tis vain-farewel-
At that last word what agonies I feel!

I faint I die-remember I was true
'Tis all I afk-eternally adieu! ----

FLORA

FLORA to POMPE Y.

By the Same.

Pompey, when he was very young, fell in love with Flora, a Roman courtezan, who was so very beautiful that the Romans had her painted to adorn the temple of Caftor and Pollux. Geminius (Pompey's friend) afterwards fell in love with her too; but she, prepoffeffed with a paffion for Pompey, would not listen to Geminius. Pompey, in compaffion to his friend, yielded him his mistress, which Flora took so much to heart, that she fell dangerously ill upon it; and in that fickness is fuppofed to write the following letter to Pompey.

E

RE death these clofing eyes for ever shade,

(That death thy cruelties have welcome made) Receive, thou yet lov'd man! this one adieu, This last farewel to happiness and you.

My eyes o'erflow with tears, my trembling hand
Can scarce the letters form, or pen command:
The dancing paper swims before my fight,

And scarce myself can read the words I write.

Think you behold me in this loft eftate, And think yourself the author of my fate:

VOL. IV.

G

How

How vaft the change! your Flora's now become
The gen'ral pity, not the boaft of Rome.
This form, a pattern to the fculptor's art,

This face, the idol once of Pompey's heart,
(Whose pictur'd beauties Rome thought fit to place
The facred temples of her gods to grace)
Are charming now no more; the bloom is fled,
The lillies languid, and the rofes dead.

Soon fhall fome hand the glorious work deface,
Where Grecian pencils tell what Flora was:
No longer my resemblance they impart,

They loft their likeness, when I loft thy heart.
Oh! that thofe hours could take their turn again,
When Pompey, lab'ring with a jealous pain,
His Flora thus bespoke : "Say, my dear love!
"Shall all these rivals unfuccefsful prove?

"In vain, for ever, fhall the Roman youth

66

Envy my happiness, and tempt thy truth?

"Shall neither tears nor pray'rs thy pity move?

"Ah! give not pity, 'tis akin to love.

"Would Flora were not fair in fuch excess,

"That I might fear, though not adore her lefs."

Fool that I was, I fought to eafe that grief, Nor knew indiff'rence follow'd the relief:

Experience