Rich with immortal green above the rest:
Whether, adopted to fome neighb'ring star,
Thou roll'st above us, in thy wand'ring race,
Or, in proceffion fix'd and regular,
Mov'd with the heaven's majestic pace;
Or, call'd to more fuperior bliss,

Thou tread'ft, with feraphims, the vast abyss:
Whatever happy region is thy place,

Cease thy celestial song a little space;
Thou wilt have time enough for hymns divine,
Since heaven's eternal year is thine.
Hear then a mortal muse thy praise rehearse,
In no ignoble verse ;

But fuch as thy own voice did practise here,
When thy first fruits of Poefy were given;
To make thyself a welcome inmate there:
While yet a young probationer,

And candidate of heaven:

II.

If by traduction came thy mind,
Our wonder is the lefs to find
A foul fo charming from a flock fo good;
Thy father was transfus'd into thy blood:
So wert thou born into a tuneful ftrain,
An early, rich, and inexhausted vein.

But if thy pre-existing soul

Was form'd, at firft, with myriads more, It did thro all the mighty poets roll,

Who Greek or Latin laurels wore,

And was that Sappho laft, which once it was before.

If so, then cease thy flight, O heaven-born mind!

Thou haft no drofs to purge from thy rich ore : Nor can thy foul a fairer manfion find,

Than was the beauteous frame fhe left behind: Return to fill or mend the choir of thy celestial kind.

III.

May we prefume to say, that, at thy birth, New joy was sprung in heaven, as well as here on earth.

For fure the milder planets did combine
On thy aufpicious horofcope to fhine,

And e'en the most malicious were in trine.
Thy brother-angels at thy birth

Strung each his lyre, and tun'd it high,
That all the people of the sky

Might know a poetefs was born on earth,
And then, if ever, mortal ears

IIad heard the mufic of the fpheres

And if no cluft'ring fwarm of bees

On thy fweet mouth diftill'd their golden dew,

'Twas that fuch vulgar miracles

Heaven had not leisure to renew:

For all thy bleft fraternity of love Solemniz'd there thy birth, and kept thy holy-day

above.

IV.

O gracious God! how far have we
Prophan'd thy heavenly gift of poefy?
Made prostitute and profligate the Muse,
Debas'd to each obfcene and impious ufe,
Whofe harmony was first ordain'd above
For tongues of angels, and for hymns of love?
O wretched we! why were we hurry'd down
This lubrique and adult'rate age,

(Nay added fat pollutions of our own)
T'increase the streaming ordures of the stage?
What can we fay t'excufe our fecond fall?
Let this thy veftal, heaven, atone for all:
Her Arethufian ftream remains unfoil'd,
.Unmix'd with foreign filth, and undefil'd;

Her wit was more than man, her innocence a

child.

V.

Art she had none, yet wanted none;
For nature did that want supply:
So rich in treasures of her own,
She might our boasted stores defy:
Such noble vigor did her verse adorn,

That it seem'd borrow'd, where 'twas only born.
Her morals too were in her bofom bred,

By great examples daily fed,

What in the beft of books, her father's life, the read.
And to be read herself the need not fear;
Each test, and every light, her muse will bear,
Tho Epictetus with his lamp were there.
E'en love (for love sometimes her muse expreft)
Was but a lambent flame which play'd about her
breaft:

Light as the vapors of a morning dream,
So cold herself, whilft fhe fuch warmth expreft,
'Twas Cupid bathing in Diana's fstream.

VI.

Born to the fpacious empire of the Nine,
One would have thought, fhe fhould have been

content

To manage well that mighty government;

But what can young ambitious fouls confine?

To the next realm fhe ftretch'd her fway,
For Painture near adjoining lay,
A plenteous province, and alluring prey.

A Chamber of Dependencies was fram'd. (As conquerors will never want pretence, When arm'd, to juftify th' offence)

And the whole fief, in right of poetry, fhe claim'd.
The country open lay without defence:

For poets frequent inroads there had made,
And perfectly could represent

The shape, the face, with every

lineament;

And all the large domains which the Dumb Sifter

fway'd.

All bow'd beneath her government,

Receiv'd in triumph wherefoe'r fhe went.

Her pencil drew, whate'er her foul defign'd,
And oft the happy draught furpafs'd the image in

her mind.

The fylvan scenes of herds and flocks,
And fruitful plains and barren rocks,

Of fhallow brooks that flow'd fo clear,
The bottom did the top appear;

Of deeper too and ampler floods,
Which, as in mirrors, fhew'd the woods
Of lofty trees, with facred shades,
And perfpectives of pleasant glades,