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ORIENTAL ECLOGUES.

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ECLOGUE I.

SELIM; OR, THE SHEPHERD'S MORAL:

SCENE, A VALLEY NEAR BAGDAT.

TIME, THE MORNING.

E Perfian maids, attend your poet's lays,

YE

And hear how fhepherds pafs their golden days.

Not all are bleft, whom fortune's hand fuftains
With wealth in courts, nor all that haunt the plains:
Well may your hearts believe the truths I tell ;
'Tis virtue makes the blifs, where'er we dwell.

Thus Selim fung, by facred Truth infpir'd;
Nor praife, but fuch as Truth beftow'd, defir'd:
Wife in himself, his meaning fongs convey'd
Informing morals to the fhepherd maid;

Or taught the fwains that fureft bliss to find,
What groves nor ftreams beftow, a virtuous mind.

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When sweet and blushing, like a virgin bride, The radiant morn resum'd her orient pride,

When wanton gales along the valleys play,

Breathe on each flower, and bear their sweets away;
By Tigris' wandering waves he fat, and fung
This useful leffon for the fair and young.

Ye Perfian dames, he faid, to you belong,
Well may they please, the morals of my fong:
No fairer maids, I truft, than you are found,
Grac❜d with soft arts, the peopled world around!
The morn that lights you, to your loves fupplies
Each gentler ray delicious to your eyes:

For you thofe flowers her fragrant hands bestow,
And yours the love that kings delight to know.
Yet think not thefe, all beauteous as they are,

The best kind bleffings heaven can grant the fair I
Who truft alone in beauty's feeble ray,

Boaft but the worth Baffora's pearls display;

Drawn from the deep we own their surface bright, But, dark within, they drink no luftrous light:

Such

Such are the maids, and fuch the charms they boast, By fenfe unaided, or to virtue lost.

Self-flattering fex! your hearts believe in vain

That love fhall blind, whence once he fires the fwain ;

Or hope a lover by your faults to win,

As fpots on ermin beautify the fkin:
Who seeks fecure to rule, be first her carè
Each fofter virtue that adorns the fair
Each tender paffion man delights to find,
The lov'd perfections of a female mind!

;

Bleft were the days, when wisdom held her reign, And fhepherds fought her on the filent plain; With Truth fhe wedded in the fecret grove, Immortal Truth, and daughters blefs'd their love.

O hafte, fair maids! ye Virtues come away, Sweet Peace and Plenty lead you on your way! The balmy shrub, for you shall love our fhore, By Ind excell'd or Araby no more.

Loft to our fields, for fo the fates ordain,

The dear deferters fhall return again.
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