A CONTEMPLATION Ο Ν N I G HT. WHETHER amid the gloom of night I ftray, Or my glad eyes enjoy revolving day, Still Nature's various face informs my sense, gay When the fun first breaks the shades of night, And strikes the distant eastern hills with light, Colour returns, the plains their livery wear, And a bright verdure clothes the fmiling year; The blooming flowers with opening beauties glow, And grazing flocks their milky fleeces show; The barren cliffs with chalky fronts arise, And a pure azure arches o'er the skies. But, when the gloomy reign of Night returns, Stript of her fading pride all nature mourns : The trees no more their wonted verdure boast, But weep in dewy tears their beauty loft: No diftant landscapes draw our curious eyes; Wrapt in Night's robe the whole creation lies. Yet ftill, e'en now, while darkness clothes the land, We view the traces of th' Almighty hand; Millions of ftars in heaven's wide vault appear, And with new glories hangs the boundless sphere: Her THOUGH T ON E TE R NIT Y. . ERE the foundations of the world were laid, Th' immortal foul shares but a part of thee; Ah! what is life? with ills encompass'd round, Then Then feeble age will all thy nerves difarm, No more thy blood its narrow channels warm. The virtuous foul pursues a nobler aim, For, while the boundless theme extends our thought, Ten thousand thousand rolling years are nought. A N EPIGRAMMATICAL EXPOSTULATION*. FROM Mohock and from Hawkubite, Good Lord, deliver me; Who wander through the streets by night, Committing cruelty. They flash our fons with bloody knives, And on our daughters fall; We have good luck withal. Coaches and chairs they overturn, Nay carts moft easily: Therefore from Gog, and eke Magog, Good Lord, deliver me! * Annexed, in 1712, to Gay's "Wonderful Prophecy, &c." humorous treatife on the Mohocks. EPI |