Ambition this fhall tempt to rife,

Then whirl the wretch from high,
To bitter Scorn a facrifice,
And grinning Infamy,

The ftings of Falsehood those shall try,
And hard Unkindness' alter'd eye,
That mocks the tear it forc'd to flow;
And keen Remorse, with blood defil'd,
And moody Madness laughing wild
Amid fevereft woe.

**

Lo, in the vale of years beneath A griefly troop are feen,

The painful family of Death,

More hideous than their Queen :

This racks the joints, this fires the veins,
That every labouring finew strains,
Thofe in the deeper vitals rage:

Lo, Poverty, to fill the band,

That numbs the foul with icy hand,

And flow-confuming Age.

To each his fufferings: all are men, Condemn'd alike to groan;

The tender for another's pain,

Th' unfeeling for his own.

Madness laughing in his ireful mood.

Dryden's Fable of Palamon and Arcite.

Yet

Yet ah! why should they know their fate!
Since Sorrow never comes too late,
And Happiness too fwiftly flies.
Thought would deftroy their paradife,
No more; where Ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.

!

HYMN

H Y M

TO

N

ADVERSITY.

D

Ζῆνα

Τὸν φρονεῖν βρολὰς ὁδώ

σαλα, τῷ πάθει μαθών
Θένα κυρίως ἔχειν.

ÆSCHYLUS, in Agamemnone.

AUGHTER of Jove, relentless Power,

Thou tamer of the human breast,

Whofe iron fcourge, and torturing hour,

The bad affright, afflict the best!

Bound in thy adamantine chain

The proud are taught to tafte of pain,

And purple tyrants vainly groan

With pangs unfelt before, unpitied, and alone.

When first thy fire to fend on earth
Virtue, his darling child, defign'd,
To thee he gave the heavenly birth,
And bade to form her infant mind.
Stern rugged nurfe; thy rigid lore
With patience many a year fhe bore:

What forrow was, thou bad'ft her know,

And from her own fhe learn'd to melt at others woe.

Scar'd at thy frown terrific, fly

Self-pleafing Folly's idle brood,

Wild Laughter, Noife, and thoughtless Joy,

And leave us leisure to be good.

Light

1

Light they difperfe, and with them go.

The fummer friend, the flattering foe;

By vain prosperity receiv'd,

To her they vow their truth, and are again believ'd.

Wisdom, in fable garb array'd,

Immers'd in rapturous thought profound,

And Melancholy, filent maid,

With leaden eye, that loves the ground,

Still on thy folemn steps attend :

Warm Charity, the general Friend,

With Juftice, to herself fevere,

And Pity, dropping foft the fadly-pleafing tear.

Oh, gently on thy fuppliant's head,

Dread goddess, lay thy chaftening hand!

Not in thy gorgon terrors clad,

Nor circled with the vengeful band

(As by the impious thou art feen)

With thundering voice, and threatening mien,
With fcreaming Horror's funeral cry,
Despair, and fell Disease, and ghaftly Poverty.

Thy form benign, oh goddess wear,
Thy milder influence impart,
Thy philofophic train be there

To foften, not to wound my

heart.

The generous spark extinct revive.

Teach me to love and to forgive,

Exact my own defects to scan,

What others are, to feel, and know myself a man.

ELEGY

G Y

E LE G

WRITTEN IN A

COUNTRY CHURCH-YARD..

THE Curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

The lowing herd wind flowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimmering landfcape on the fight,
And all the air a folemn ftilnefs holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the diftant folds;
Save that, from yonder ivy-mantled tower,
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of fuch as, wandering near her fecret bower,
Moleft her ancient folitary reign.

Beneath thofe rugged elins, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,

The rude Forefathers of the hamlet fleep.

The breezy call of incenfe-breathing Morn,
The fwallow twittering from the ftraw-built fhed,
The cock's fhrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more fhall rouze them from their lowly bed.

"fquilla di lontano

"Che paia 'l giorno pianger, che fi muore.”

DANTE. PURGAT: 1. 3.