Go

O on, my friend, the noble talk pursue,

And think thy genius is thy country's due ; To vulgar wits inferior themes belong, But Liberty and Virtue claim thy song. Yet cease to hope, though grac'd with every charm, The patriot verse will cold Britannia warm; Vainly thou striv'it our languid hearts to raise, By great examples drawn from better days: No longer we to Sparta's fame aspire, What Sparta scorn'd, instructed to admire.; Nurs'd in the love of wealth, and form’d to bend Our narrow thoughts to that inglorious end : No generous purpose can enlarge the mind, No social care, no labour for mankind, Where mean self-interest every action guides,

commands, in cabinets presides; Where luxury consumes the guilty store, And bids the villain be a save for more.

Hence, wretched nation, all thy woes arise,
Avow'd corruption, licens’d perjuries,
Eternal taxes, treaties for a day,
Servants that rule, and senates that obey.

people,

In camps

Opeople, far unlike the Grecian race,
That deems a virtuous poverty disgrace,
- That suffers public wrongs and public shame,

In council insolent, in action tame!
Say, what is now th' ambition of the great ?
Is it to raise their country's finking state;
Her load of debt to ease by frugal care,
Her trade to guard, her harrass’d poor to spare ?
Is it, like honest Somers, to inspire
The love of laws, and Freedom's facred fire ?
Is it, like wise Godolphin, to sustain
The balanc'd world, and boundless power

restrain ?
Or is the mighty aim of all their toil,
Only to aid the wreck, and hare the spoil ?
On each relation, friend, dependant, pour,
With partial wantonness, the golden shower,
And, fenc'd by strong corruption, to defpife
An injur'd nation's unavailing cries?
Rouze, Britons, rouze! if sense of thame be weak,
Let the loud voice of threatening danger speak.
Lo! France, as Persia

every

land
Prepares to stretch her all-oppressing hand.
Shall England fit regardless and fedate,
A calm spectatress of the general fate;
Or call forth all her virtue, oppose,
Like valiant Greece, her own and Europe's foes ?
Q let us seize the moment in our power,
Our follies now have reach'd the fatal hour;
No later term the angry gods ordain ;
This crisis loft, we shall be wise in vain.

onice, o'er

And thou, great poet, in whose nervous lines
The native majesty of freedom shines,
Accept this friendly praise ; and let me prove
My heart not wholly void of public love;
Though not like thee I strike the founding ftring
To notes which Sparta might have deign'd to fing,
But, idly sporting in the secret shade,
With tender trifles soothe fome artless maid.

TO WILLIAM PIT T, ESQUIRE,

ON

HIS

LOSING HIS COMMISSION,

In the Year 1736.

LO

ONG had thy virtues mark'd thee out for fame,

Far, far superior to a Cornet's name;
This generous Walpole saw, and griev'd to find
So mean a poft disgrace that noble mind.
The servile standard from thy freeborn hand
He took, and bade thee lead the patriot.band.

PRO.

I

COME not here your candour to implore

For scenes, whose author is,, alas ! no more ; :
He wants no advocate his cause to plead; -
You will yourselves be patrons of the dead.
No party

his benevolence.confin'd,
No feet - alike it flow'd to all mankind.
He lov'd his friends (forgive this gushing tear :
Alas! I feel, I am no actor here)
He lov'd his friends with fuch a warmth of heart,
So clear of interest, so devoid of art,
Such generous friendship, such unshaken-zeal,
No words can speak it; but our tears may

tell,
O candid truth, O faith without a stain,
O manners gently firm, and nobly plain,
O fympathizing love of others' bliss,
Where will you find another breast like his ?
Such was the man the

poet
well
you

know:
Oft has he touch'd your hearts with tender woe :
Oft in this crouded house, with just applause,
You heard him teach fair Virtue's purest laws;
For his chaste Mufe employ'd her heaven-taught lyre
None but the noblest passions to inspire,

Not

H 3

Not one immoral, one corrupted thought,
One line, which dying he could wish to blot. :

Oh! may to-night your favourable doom
Another laurel add, to grace his tomb:
Whilft he, superior now to praise or blame,
Hears not the feeble voice of human fame.
Yet, if to those whom moft on earth he lov'd,
From whom his pious care is now remov’d,
With whom his liberal hand, and bounteous heart,
Shar'd all his little fortune could impart;
If to those friends your kind regard shall give
What they no longer can from his receive;
That, that, ev'n now, above yon starry pole,
May touch with pleasure his immortal foul.

YOU, who, fupreme o'er every work of wit

,
In judgment here, unaw'd, uubiass'd, sit,
The palatines and guardians of the pit;
If to your minds this merely modern play
No useful fense, no generous warmth convey;
If fuftian here, through each unnatural scene,
In Prain' d conceits found bigh, and nothing mean ;
If lofty dullness for your vengeance call :
Like Elmerick judge, and let the guilty fall.

But