ODE TO FEAR.

HOU, to whom the world unknown

TH

With all its shadowy shapes is fhewn ;
Who feeft appall'd th' unreal scene,
While Fancy lifts the veil between :
Ah, Fear! ah, frantic Fear!

I fee, I fee thee near.

I know thy hurried step, thy haggard eye!
Like thee I start, like thee disorder'd fly,
For, lo, what monsters in thy train appear!
Danger, whofe limbs of giant mold
What mortal eye can fix'd behold?
Who stalks his round, an hideous form,
Howling amidst the midnight storm,
Or throws him on the ridgy steep
Of fome loofe hanging rock to fleep:
And with him thousand phantoms join'd,
Who prompt to deeds accurs'd the mind:
And those, the fiends, who near allied,
O'er nature's wounds and wrecks prefide;
While Vengeance, in the lurid air,
Lifts her red arm, expos'd and bare :
On whom that ravening brood of fate,
Who lap the blood of Sorrow, wait;
Who, Fear, this ghaftly train can see,
And look not madly wild, like thee?
R 4

EPODE.

EPODE.

In earliest Greece, to thee, with partial choice,
The grief-full Muse addrest her infant tongue;
The maids and matrons, on her aweful voice,
Silent and pale, in wild amazement hung.
Yet he, the Bard* who firft invok'd thy name,
Difdain'd in Marathon its power to feel:
For not alone he nurs'd the poet's flame,

But reach'd from Virtue's hand the patriot's steel. But who is he, whom later garlands grace,

Who left a while o'er Hybla's dews to rove, With trembling eyes thy dreary steps to trace, Where thou and furies fhar'd the baleful grove? Wrapt in thy cloudy veil th' incestuous Queen + Sigh'd the fad call her fon and husband heard, When once alone it broke the filent fcene,

And he the wretch of Thebes no more appear'd. O Fear, I know thee by my throbbing heart, Thy withering power infpir'd each mournful line, Though gentle Pity claim her mingled part, Yet all the thunders of the fcene are thine.

ANTISTROPHE.

Thou who fuch weary lengths haft past, Where wilt thou rest, mad nymph, at last ? Say, wilt thou shroud in haunted cell,

Where gloomy Rape and Murder dwell?

* fchylus.

+ Jocafta.

Or

Or in fome hollow'd feat,

'Gainst which the big waves beat,

Hear drowning feamen's cries in tempests brought! Dark power, with shuddering meek submitted thought, Be mine, to read the vifions old,

Which thy awakening bards have told.

And, left thou meet my blafted view,
Hold each strange tale devoutly true;
Ne'er be I found, by thee o'er-aw'd,
In that thrice-hallow'd eve abroad,
When ghofts, as cottage-maids believe,
Their pebbled beds permitted leave,
And goblins haunt from fire, or fen,
Or mine, or flood, the walks of men!
O thou, whose spirit most poffeft
The facred feat of Shakespeare's breft!
By all that from thy prophet broke,
In thy divine emotions spoke !
Hither again thy fury deal,

Teach me but once like him to feel:
His cyprefs wreath my meed decree,

And I, O Fear, will dwell with thee!

ODE TO

SIMPLICITY.

Thou, by Nature taught,

To breathe her genuine thought,

In numbers warmly pure, and sweetly strong:

Who firft on mountains wild,

In Fancy, loveliest child,

Thy babe, and Pleasure's, nurs'd the powers of fong!

Thou,

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 chaste, unboastful nymph, to thee I call !

By all the honey'd store

On Hybla's thymy shore,

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 diftinguifh'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 forceless numbers mean:
For thou haft left her shrine,

Nor olive more, nor vine,

Shall gain thy feet to bless the servile scene.

Though tafte, though genius blefs

To fome divine excefs,

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

May court, may charm our eye,

Thou, only thou, canst raise the meeting foul !

Of these let others afk,

To aid some 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.