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The fair, who trufts their prostituted vows,
If not their falfhood, ftill their boafts expofe;
Nor knows the wifeft to elude the harm!

E'en she whofe prudence fhuns the tinfel charm,
They know to flander, though they fail to warm:
They make her languifh in fictitious flame,
Affix fome fpecious scandal on her name,
And baffled by her virtue, triumph o'er her fame!
These are the leaders of thy blinded youth,
These vile feducers laugh'd thee out of truth;
Whofe fcurril jefts all folemn ties profane,
Or Friendship's band, or Hymen's facred chain;
Morality as weakness they upbraid,

Nor é'en revere Religion's hallow'd head;
Alike they fpurn divine and human laws,
And treat the honeft like the christian caufe.
Curfe on that tongue whofe vile pernicious art
Delights the ear but to corrupt the heart,
That takes advantage of the chearful hour,
When weaken'd Virtue bends to Nature's pow'rs
And would the goddess in the foul efface,
To fubftitute dishonour in her place.

With fuch you lofe the day in falfe delight,
In lewd debauch you revel out the night.
O fatal commerce to Monimia's peace!)
Their arguments convince because they please
Whilft fophiftry for reafon they admit,
And wander dazzled in the glare of wit:
Wit that on ill a fpecious luftre throws,
And in falfe colours ev'ry object shows;
That gilds the wrong, depreciating the right,
And hurts the judgment, while it feafts the fight,
So in the prism, to the deluded eye,

Each pictur'd trifle takes a rainbow dye;
With borrow'd charms the gaudy profpect glows,
But truth revers'd the faithlefs mirror fhows;

}

Inverted

Inverted scenes in bright confufion lie,
And lawns impending fhade the nether sky;
No juft, no real images we meet,

But all the fhining vision is deceit.

Oft I revolve, in this diftracted mind,

Each word, each look, that spoke my charmer kind;
But oh! how dear their memory I pay !

What pleasures paft can prefent cares allay ?

Of all I love for ever difpoffefs'd:

Ah! what avails, to think I once was blefs'd!
Hard difpofition of unequal fate,

Mix'd are our joys, and tranfient are their date;
Nor can reflection bring them back again,

Yet brings an after-fting to ev'ry pain.
Thy fatal letters, O immoral youth,
Those perjur'd pledges of fictitious truth,
Dear as they were, no fecond joy afford,
My cred❜lous heart once leap'd at ev'ry word,
My glowing bofom throbb'd with thick-heav'd fighs,
And floods of rapture rush'd into mine eyes:
When now repeated (for the theft was vain,
Each treafur'd fyllable my thoughts retain)
Far other paffions rule, and diff'rent care,
My joys are grief, my transports are despair.
Why doft thou mock the ties of conftant love?
But half it's joys the faithlefs ever prove;
They only taste the pleafures they receive,
When, fure, the nobleft is in those we give.
Acceptance is the heav'n which mortals know,
But 'tis the blifs of angels to bestow.
Oh! emulate, my love, that task divine,
Be thou that angel, and that heav'n be mine.
Yes, yet relent, yet intercept my fate:
Alas! I rave, and fue for new deceit.

Firft vital warmth fhall from the grave return,
Ere love, extinguifh'd, with fresh ardour burn.

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Oh! that I dar'd to act a Roman part,
And ftab thy image in this faithful heart,
There riveted to life fecure you reign,
Ah! cruel inmate! fharp'ning ev'ry pain:
While, coward-like, irrefolute I wait
Time's tardy aid, nor dare to rush on fate;
Perhaps may linger on life's latest stage,
Survive thy cruelties, and fall by age :

No-grief shall spread my fails, and speed me o'er
(Defpair my pilot) to that quiet fhore,
Where I can truft, and thou betray no more.
Might I but once again behold thy charms,
Might I but breathe my last in those dear arms,
On that lov'd face but fix my closing eye,
Permitted where I might not live to die,
My foften'd fate I wou'd accufe no more!
But fate has no fuch happiness in store.,

'Tis paft, 'tis done-what gleam of hope behind,
When I can ne'er be false, nor thou be kind?
Why, then, this care?-'tis weak-'tis vain-farewel-
At that laft word what agonies I feel!

I faint- -I die-remember, I was true

'Tis all I ask-eternally-adieu !-

}

THE LAWYER's FAREWEL TO HIS MUSE.

As

BY WILLIAM BLACKSTONE, ESQ.

S, by fome tyrant's ftern command,
A wretch forfakes his native land,

In foreign climes condemn'd to roam
An endless exile from his home;
Penfive he treads the deftin'd way,

And dreads to go, nor dares to stay;

Till on fome neighb'ring mountain's brow

He ftops, and turns his

eyes below;

There,

There, melting at the well-known view,
Drops a laft tear, and bids adieu:
So I, thus doom'd from thee to part,
Gay queen of fancy and of art,
Reluctant move, with doubtful mind,
Oft stop, and often look behind.
Companion of my tender age,
Serenely gay, and sweetly fage,
How blithfome were we wont to rove
By verdant hill, or shady grove,

Where fervent bees, with humming voice,
Around the honey'd oak rejoice,

And aged elms with awful bend,
In long cathedral walks extend!
Lull'd by the lapfe of gliding floods,
Chear'd by the warbling of the woods,

How blefs'd my days, my thoughts how free,

In fweet fociety with thee!

Then all was joyous, all was young,

And years unheeded roll'd along:

But now the pleafing dream is o'er,
These scenes muft charm me now no more;
Loft to the field, and torn from you-
Farewel!—a long, a last adieu.

Me, wrangling courts, and ftubborn Law,
To fmoak, and crowds, and cities draw;
There selfish Faction rules the day,
And Pride and Av'rice throng the way:
Diseases taint the murky air,
And midnight conflagrations glare;
Loose Revelry and Riot bold,
In frighted ftreets their orgies hold;
Or, when in filence all is drown'd,
Fell murder walks her lonely round:
No room for peace, no room for you,
Adieu, celeftial nymph, adieu!
2 N 2

Shakespeare

Shakespeare, no more thy fylvan fon,
Nor all the art of Addifon,

Pope's heav'n-ftrung lyre, nor Waller's cafe,
Nor Milton's mighty felf muft please:
Inftead of thefe, a formal band

In furs and coifs around me ftand;
With founds uncouth, and accents dry,
That grate the foul of harmony;
Each pedant fage unlocks his ftore
Of myftick, dark, difcordant lore;
And points with tott'ring hand the ways.
That lead me to the thorny maze.
There, in a winding, clofe retreat,
Is Juftice doom'd to fix her feat;
There, fenc'd by bulwarks of the law,
She keeps the wond'ring world in awe;
And there, from vulgar fight retir'd,
Like eastern queens, is more admir'd.

O let me pierce the fecret fhade

Where dwells the venerable maid!
There humbly mark, with rev'rend awe,

The guardian of Britannia's law;
Unfold with joy her facred page,
(Th' united boast of many an age,
Where mix'd, yet uniform, appears
The wisdom of a thousand years)
In that pure fpring the bottom view,
Clear, deep, and regularly true,
And other doctrines thence imbibe,
Than lurk within the fordid scribe:
Obferve how parts with parts unite
In one harmonious rule of right;
See countless wheels diftinctly tend
By various laws to one great end;
While mighty Alfred's piercing foul
Pervades and regulates the whole.

Then

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