Are found no more amid these iron times, Is off the poise within the passions all Have burst their bounds; and reason half extinct, 275 The foul disorder. Senseless, and deform'd, 280 Convulsive anger storms at large; or pale, Base envy withers at another's joy, And hates that excellence it cannot reach. THESE, and a thousand mixt emotions more, From ever-changing views of good and ill, 285 290 295 With endless storm: whence, deeply rankling, grows The partial thought, a listless unconcern, Cold, and averting from our neighbour's good; Then dark disgust, and hatred, winding wiles, Coward deceit, and ruffian violence: At last, extinct each social feeling, fell And joyless inhumanity pervades And petrifies the heart. Nature disturb'd 300 305 Is deem'd vindictive, to have chang'd her course. And o'er the high-pil'd hills of fractur'd earth THE Seasons since have, with severer sway, Oppress'd a broken world: The Winter keen Shook forth his waste of snows; and Summer shot His pestilential heats. Great Spring, before, 310 315 Green'd all the year; and fruits and blossoms blush'd, In social sweetness on the self-same bough. Pure was the temp'rate air; an even calm Perpetual reign'd, save what the zephyrs bland Breath'd o'er the blue expanse; for then nor storms Were taught to blow, nor hurricanes to rage; 325 Swell'd in the sky, and sent the lightning forth; From clear to cloudy tost, from hot to cold, AND yet the wholesome herb neglected dies; 330 335 340 And worse. The wolf, who from the nightly fold Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast. But Man, whom Nature form'd of milder clay, With every kind emotion in his heart, And taught alone to weep; while from her lap 350 She pours ten thousand delicacies; herbs, And fruits, as numerous as the drops of rain Or beams that gave them birth: Shall he, fair form! Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on Heaven, E'er stoop to mingle with the prowling herd, 355 And dip his tongue in gore? The beast of prey, 360 With all the pomp of harvest; shall he bleed, 365 And struggling groan beneath the cruel hands 370 Light on the numbers of the SAMIAN sage. High HEAVEN forbids the bold presumptuous strain, Whose wisest will has fix'd us in a state That must not yet to pure perfection rise. 375 Now when the first foul torrent of the brooks, Swell'd with the vernal rains, is ebb'd away; 380 To tempt the trout. The well-dissembled fly, The rod fine-tapering with elastic spring, 385 390 WHEN with his lively ray the potent sun Has pierc'd the streams, and rous'd the finny race, Then, issuing cheerful, to thy sport repair; Chief should the western breezes curling play, And light o'er ether bear the shadowy clouds, High to their fount, this day, amid their hills, And woodlands warbling round, trace up the brooks; The next, pursue their rocky-channel'd maze, Down to the river, in whose ample wave 395 Their little naiads love to sport at large. 400 JUST in the dubious point, where with the pool, Is mix'd the trembling stream, or where it boils 405 |