Слике страница
PDF
ePub

No more I figh'd, complain'd, or fwore;
The nymph's coy arts appear'd no more,
But each could laugh at what we felt before.

Well-pleas'd we pass'd the cheerful day,,
To unreferv'd: difcourfe refign'd,.
And I enchanted to furvey.
One generous woman's real mind:
But foon I wonder'd what poffefs'd
Each wakeful,night my anxious breaft;
No other friendship e'er had broke my reft.

Fool that I was-and now, even now
While thus I preach the Stoic train,
Unless I fhun Dione's view,

An hour unfays it all again.

O friend!-when Love directs her eyes
To pierce where every passion lies,

Where is the firm, the cautious, or the wife?

SECT.

DR. AKENSIDE..

LXXIII.

ON LEAVING HOLLAND.

ADIEU to Leyden's lonely bound,

The Belgian Mufe's fober feat;

Where fhedding frugal gifts around:
On all the fav'rites at her feet,
She feeds the body's bulky frame
For paffive, perfevering toils;
And left, for fome ambitious aim,,

The

The daring mind fhould fcorn her homely fpoils,, She breathes maternal fogs to damp its restless flame..

Adieu the grave, pacific air,

Safe from the flitting mountain-breeze;
The marshy levels lank and bare,

Sacred from furrows, hills or trees:
Adieu each mantling, fragrant flood,
Untaught to murmur or to flow:
Adieu the mufic of the mud,

That fooths at eve the patient lover's woe, And wakes to fprightlier thoughts the painful poet's blood..

With looks fo frofty, and with fteps fo tame,.
Ye careful nymphs, ye household things, adieu:
Not once ye taught me love's or friendfhip's flame,
And where is he that ever taught it you?
And ye, the flow-eyed fathers of the land,
With whom dominion lurks from hand to hand,,
Unown'd, undignified by public choice,
I go where freedom in the ftreets is known,
And tells a monarch on his throne,

Tells him he reigns, he lives but by her voice..

O native Albion, when to thee

Shall I return to part no more?
Far from this pale discolour'd sea,,
That fleeps upon the reedy thore,,
When shall I plow thy nzure tides,
And, as thy fleece-white hills afpire,.
Blefs the fair fhade that on their fides

[blocks in formation]

Imbowers the village and the facred fpire,
While the green hedge, below, the golden flope divides?

Ye nymphs that guard the pathlefs grove,
Ye blue-eyed fifters of the ftreams,

With whom I wont at morn to rove,
With whom at noon I talk'd in dreams;
O take me to your haunts again,

The rocky fpring, the greenwood glade;

To prompt my flumbers in the murm'ring fhade,
And footh my vacant ear with many an airy strain.

And thou, my faithful harp, no longer mourn
Thy drooping mafter's unpropitious hand;
Now brighter skies and fresher gales return,
Now fairer maids thy melody demand.
Daughters of Albion, guard your votive lyre!
O blooming God of Thefpia's laurell'd quire,
Why founds not mine harmonious as thy own,
When all the virgin-deities above

With Venus and with Juno move

In concert round thy liftening father's throne?

Το

Thee too, protectress of my lays,
Elate with whofe majestic call
Above the foft Italian's praife,
Above the flavish wreaths of Gaul,
I dare from impious thrones reclaim,
And wanton floth's luxurious charms,
The honours of a poet's name :

* Afhley's wifdom, or to Hamden's arms, Thee, Freedom, I rejoin, and bless thy genuine flame.

* The Earl of Shaftesbury.

Great

[ocr errors]

Great citizen of Albion! thee
Heroic valour still attends,

And useful science pleas'd to fee
How art her ftudious toil extends..
While truth, diffufing from on high
A luftre unconfin'd as day,

Fills and commands the public eye,

Till, pierc'd and finking by her powerful ray,
Tame floth and monkish awe, like nightly demons, fly.

Hence all the land the patriot's ardour shares;
Hence dread religion fmiles with focial joy;
Hence the free bosom's softest, lovelieft carcs,
Each graceful. fcene of private iife employ.
O fair Britannia, hail!-with partial love
The tribes of men their native feats approve,
Unjuft and hoftile to a foreign fame;
But when from generous minds and manly laws
A nation holds her prime applaufe,
There public zeal defies the teft of blame..

DR. AKENSIDE,

SECT. LXXIV.

TO SLEEP.

THOU
HQU filent power, whose balmy sway
Charms every anxious thought away;
In whofe divine oblivion drown'd,
Fatigue and toiling pain grow mild,
Love is with fweet fuccefs beguil'd,

And

And fad Remorfe forgets her fecret wound; O whither haft thou flown, indulgent god? God of kind shadows and of healing dews, O'er whom doft thou extend thy magic rod? Around what peaceful couch thy opiate-airs diffuse??

Lo, midnight from her ftarry reign.

Looks awful down on earth and main;
The tuneful birds lie hufh'd in fleep,
With all that crop the verdant food,
With all that skim the crystal flood,.
Or haunt the caverns of the rocky steep.
No rushing winds disturb the tufted bowers;
No wakeful found the moonlight valley knows,
Save where the brook its liquid murmur pours,
And lulls the waving scene to more profound repose..

Olet not me thus watch alone!!
O hear my folitary moan!

Defcend, propitious, on my eyes;:
Not from the couch that bears a crown,
Not from the ftatefman's thorny down,

Or where the miser and his treasure lies;
Bring not the shapes that break the murderer's reft
Nor thofe the hireling foldier burns to fee,

Nor those that haunt the tyrant's gloomy breast: Far be their guilty nights, and far their dreams from me!!

Nor yet thofe awful joys prefent,
For chiefs and heroes only meant:
The figur'd brafs, the choral fong,,
The refcued people's glad applaufe,
The liftening fenate, and the laws,

Bent

« ПретходнаНастави »