Ruin from man is moft conceal'd when near,
And fends the dreadful tidings in the blow.
Is this the flight of fancy? Would it were!
Heaven's Sovereign faves all beings, but himself,
That hideous fight, a naked human heart.
Fir'd is the Muse? And let the Mufe be fir'd:
Who not inflam'd, when what he speaks, he feels,
And in the nerve most tender, in his friends?
Shame to mankind! Philander had his foes:
He felt the truths I fing, and I in Him.
But He, nor I, feel more: paft ills, Narciffa!
Are funk in Thee, thou recent wound of heart!
Which bleeds with other cares, with other pangs; 235
Pangs numerous, as the numerous ills that fwarm'd
O'er thy diftinguish'd fate, and, clustering There
Thick as the locufts on the land of Nile,
Made death more deadly, and more dark the grave. Reflect (if not forgot my touching tale)
How was each circumftance with afpics arm'd?
An aspic, Each! and All, an Hydra woe :
What ftrong Herculean virtue could fuffice?
Or is it virtue to be conquer'd Here?
This hoary cheek a train of tears bedews;
And each tear mourns its own diftin&t distress;
And each distress, diftinctly mourn'd, demands
Of grief ftill more, as heighten'd by the whole.
A grief like this proprietors excludes:
Not friends alone fuch obfequies deplore;
They make Mankind the mourner; carry fighs
Far as the fatal Fame can wing her way;
E 2
And turn the gayeft thought of gayest age,
Down their right channel, through the vale of death.
The vale of death! that hufh'd Cimmerian vale, 255
Where darkness, `brooding o'er unfinish'd fates,
With raven wing incumbent, waits the day
(Dread day!) that interdicts all future change!
That fubterranean world, that land of ruin !
Fit walk, Lorenzo, for proud human thought!
There let my thought expatiate, and explore
Balfamic truths, and healing fentiments,
Of all most wanted, and most welcome, here.
For gay Lorenzo's fake, and for thy own,
My foul! "The fruits of dying friends furvey; 265 "Expose the vain of life; weigh life and death; "Give death his eulogy; thy fear subdue; "And labour that first palm of noble minds, "A manly fcorn of terror from the tomb." This harvest reap from thy Narciffa's grave. As poets feign'd from Ajax' ftreaming blood "Arofe, with grief infcrib'd, a mournful flower; Let wisdom blossom from my mortal wound. And firft, of dying friends; what fruit from these? It brings us more than triple aid; an aid To chase our thoughtlessness, fear, pride, and guilt. Our dying friends come o'er us like a cloud, To damp our brainless ardors; and abate That glare of life, which often blinds the wife. Our dying friends are pioneers, to smooth Our rugged pafs to death; to break those bars Of terror, and abhorrence, nature throws
Crofs our obftructed way; and, thus to make
Welcome, as fafe, our port from every ftorm.
Each friend by fate fnatch'd from us, is a plume 285
Pluck'd from the wing of human vanity,
Which makes us ftoop from our aërial heights,
And, dampt with omen of our own decease,
On drooping pinions of ambition lower'd,
Juft fkim earth's furface, ere we break it up,
O'er putrid earth to scratch a little dust,
And fave the world a nuisance. Smitten friends
Are angels fent on errands full of love ;
For us they languish, and for us they die :
And shall they languish, fhall they die, in vain ?
Ungrateful, fhall we grieve their hovering shades,
Which wait the revolution in our hearts?
Shall we difdain their filent, foft addrefs;
Their pofthumous advice, and pious prayer?
Senfelefs, as herds that graze their hallow'd graves, 300
Tread under-foot their agonies and groans;
Fruftrate their anguish, and destroy their deaths?
Lorenzo! no; the thought of death indulge;
Give it its wholesome empire! let it reign,
That kind chaftifer of thy foul in joy!
Its reign will spread thy glorious conquefts far,
And still the tumults of thy ruffled breast :
Aufpicious æra! golden days, begin!
The thought of death fhall, like a god, infpire.
And why not think on death? Is life the theme 310
Of every thought? and wish of every hour?
And song of every joy? Surprising truth!
The beaten spaniel's fondness not so strange.
To wave the numerous ills that feize on life
As their own property, their lawful prey;
Ere man has meafur'd half his weary stage,
His luxuries have left him no reserve,
No maiden relishes, unbroach'd delights;
On cold ferv'd repetitions he subsists,
And in the taftelefs prefent chews the past;
Difgufted chews, and fcarce can swallow down.
Like lavish ancestors, his earlier years
Have difinherited his future hours,
Which starve on orts, and glean their former field,
Live ever here, Lorenzo!-fhocking thought! 325
So fhocking, they who wifh, difown it too;
Difown from fhame, what they from folly crave.
Live ever in the womb, nor fee the light?
For what live ever here ?-With labouring step
To tread our former footsteps? Pace the round
Eternal? To climb life's worn, heavy wheel,
Which draws up nothing new? To beat, and beat
The beaten track? To bid each wretched day
The former mock? To furfeit on the fame,
And yawn our joys? Or thank a misery
For change, though fad? To fee what we have feen ?
Hear, till unheard, the fame old flabber'd tale?
To tafte the tafted, and at each return
Lefs tasteful? O'er our palates to decant
Another vintage? Strain a flatter year,
Through loaded veffels, and a laxer tone?
Crazy machines to grind earth's wafted fruits!
Ill-ground, and worse concocted! Load, not life!
The rational foul kennels of excess!
Still-ftreaming thorough-fares of dull debauch!
Trembling each gulp, left death should snatch the bowl.
Such of our fine-ones is the wish refin'd!
So would they have it: elegant defire!
Why not invite the bellowing stalls, and wilds?
But fuch examples might their riot awe.
Through want of virtue, that is, want of thought,
(Though on bright thought they father all their flights)
To what are they reduc'd? To love, and hate,
The fame vain world; to cenfure, and espouse,
This painted fhrew of life, who calls them fool 355
Each moment of each day; to flatter bad
Through dread of worfe; to cling to this rude rock,
Barren, to them, of good, and sharp with ills,
And hourly blacken'd with impending ftorms,
And infamous for wrecks of human hope-
Scar'd at the gloomy gulph, that yawns beneath.
Such are their triumphs! fuch their pangs of joy!
'Tis time, high time, to fhift this difma! fcene.
This bugg'd, this hideous state, what art can cure?
One only; but that one, what all may reach;
Virtue-she, wonder-working goddess! charms
That rock to bloom; and tames the painted brew;
And, what will more furprize, Lorenzo! gives
To life's fick, naufeous iteration, change;
And ftraightens nature's circle to a line.
Believ'st thou this, Lorenzo? lend an ear,
A patient ear, thou 'It blush to disbelieve.
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