Thou, who with hermit heart

Difdain'ft the wealth of art,

And gauds, and pageant weeds, and trailing pall:

But com'ft a decent maid,

In Attic robe array'd,

O chafte, unboaftful nymph, to thee I call!

By all the honey'd store

On Hybla's thymy fhore,

By all her blooms, and mingled murmurs dear,

By her, whofe love-lorn woe,

In evening mufings flow,

Sooth'd fweetly fad Electra's poet's ear:

By old Cephifus deep,
Who fpread his wavy sweep

In warbled wanderings round thy green retreat,

On whofe enamel'd fide,

When holy Freedom died,

No equal haunt allur'd thy future feet.

O fifter meek of Truth,

To my admiring youth,

Thy fober aid and native charms infuse!
The flowers that sweetest breathe,

Though beauty cull'd the wreathe,

Still ask thy hand to range their order'd hues.

While Rome could none esteem,

But virtue's patriot theme,

You lov'd her hills, and led her laureate band;

But

But ftaid to fing alone

To one distinguish'd throne,

And turn'd thy face, and fled her alter'd land.

No more, in hall or bower,

The paffions own thy power,

Love, only Love, her forcelefs numbers mean:
For thou haft left her fhrine,

Nor olive more, nor vine,

Shall gain thy feet to bless the servile fcene.

Though tafte, though genius blefs

To fome divine excess,

Faint 's the cold work till thou infpire the whole;
What each, what all fupply,

May court, may charm our eye,

Thou, only thou, canft raise the meeting foul!

Of these let others afk,

To aid fome mighty task,

I only feek to find thy temperate vale :
Where oft my reed might found

To maids and fhepherds round,

And all thy fons, O Nature, learn my tale.

One, only one unrival'd fair*,
Might hope the magic girdle wear,
At folemn tournay hung on high,
The wish of each love-darting eye;
Lo! to each other nymph in turn applied,
As if, in air unseen, fome hovering hand,
Some chafte and angel-friend to virgin-fame,
With whisper'd spell had burst the starting band,
It left unbleft her loath'd dishonour'd fide;
Happier hopeless fair, if never

Her baffled hand with vain endeavour
Had touch'd that fatal zone to her denied!
Young Fancy thus, to me divineft name,
To whom, prepar’d and bath'd in heaven,
The ceft of ampleft power is given,

To few the god-like gift affigns,

To gird their blest prophetic loins,

And

gaze her vifions wild, and feel unmix'd her flame. The band, as fairy legends fay,

Was wove on that creating day,

When he, who call'd with thought to birth

Yon tented sky, this laughing earth,

And dreft with fprings, and forests tall,

And pour'd the main engirting all,
Long by the lov'd enthusiast woo'd,
Himself in fome diviner mood,
Retiring, fate with her alone,

And plac'd her on his fapphire throne,

* Florimel. See Spenfer, Leg. 4.

The

The whiles, the vaulted fhrine around,
Seraphic wires were heard to found,
Now fublimeft triumph fwelling;
Now on love and mercy dwelling;
And fhe, from out the veiling cloud,
Breath'd her magic notes aloud :

And thou, thou rich-hair'd youth of morn,
And all thy subject life was born ?
The dangerous paffions kept aloof,
Far from the fainted growing woof:
But near it fate ecftatic Wonder,
Liftening the deep applauding thunder:
And Truth, in funny veft array'd,
By whose the Tarfol's eyes were made;
All the shadowy tribes of Mind,
In braided dance their murmurs join'd,
And all the bright uncounted powers,
Who feed on heaven's ambrofial flowers.
Where is the Bard, whofe foul can now
Its high prefuming hopes avow?
Where he who thinks, with rapture blind,
This hallow'd work for him defign'd?
High on fome cliff, to heaven up-pil'd,
Of rude accefs, of profpect wild,
Where, tangled round the jealous steep,
Strange fhades o'erbrow the vallies deep,
And holy Genii guard the rock,
Its glooms embrown, its fprings unlock,
While on its rich ambitious head,
An Eden, like his own, lies fpread.

.

I view that oak, the fancied glades among,
By
which as Milton lay, his evening ear,
From many a cloud that dropp'd ethereal dew,

Nigh fpher'd in heaven its native ftrains could hear:
On which that ancient trump he reach'd was hung;
Thither oft his glory greeting,

From Waller's myrtle shades retreating,

With many a vow from Hope's afpiring tongue,
My trembling feet his guiding fteps pursue;
In vain-Such blifs to one alone,

Of all the fons of foul was known,

And Heaven, and Fancy, kindred powers, Have now o'erturn'd th' inspiring bowers, Or curtain'd close fuch fcene from every future view.

OD E. Written in the year 1746.

HOW fleep the brave, who fink to reft,

By all their country's wishes bleft!

When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallow'd mold,
She there fhall drefs a fweeter fod,
Than Fancy's fee have ever trod

By Fairy hands their knell is rung,
By forms unfeen their dirge is fung;
There Honour comes, a pilgrim grey,
To blefs the turf that wraps their clay,
And Freedom fhall a while repair,
To dwell a weeping hermit there!

ODE