Riches that the world bestows,
She can take, and I can lofe;
But the treafures that are mine
Lie afar beyond her line.
When I view my fpacious foul,
And furvey myself awhole,
And enjoy myfelf alone,
I'm a kingdom of my own.
I've a mighty part within
That the world hath never feen,
Rich as Eden's happy ground,
And with choicer plenty crown'd.
Here on all the thining boughs
Knowledge fair and useless grows;
On the fame young flowery tree
All the feafons you may fee;
Notions in the bloom of light,
Juft difclofing to the fight;
Here are thoughts of larger rowth,
Ripening into folid truth;
Fruits refin'd, of noble taste;
Seraphs feed on such repast.
Here, in a green and fhady grove,
Streams of pleasure mix with love:
There beneath the fmiling fkies
Hills of contemplation rise;
Now upon fome fhining top
Angels light, and call me up;
I rejoice to raife my feet,
Both rejoice when there we meet.
There are endlefs beauties more
Earth hath no refemblance for;
Nothing like them round the pole,
Nothing can describe the soul :
'Tis a region half unknown,
That has treasures of its own,
More remote from public view
Than the bowels of Peru;
Broader 'tis, and brighter far,
Then the golden Indies are;
Ships that trace the watery stage
Cannot coaft it in an age;
Harts, or horfes, ftrong and fleet,
Had they wings to help their feet,
Could not run it half way o'er
In ten thousand days and more.
Yet the filly wandering mind,
Loth to be too much confin'd,
Roves and takes her daily tours,
Coasting round the narrow shores,
Narrow fhores of flesh and fenfe,
Picking shells and pebbles thence:
Or fhe fits at fancy's door,
Calling fhapes and fhadows to her,
Foreign vifits ftill receiving,
And t' herself a stranger living.
Never, never would she buy
Indian dust, or Tyrian dye,
Never trade abroad for more,
If fhe faw her native ftore;
If her inward worth were known,
She might ever live alone.
URANIA takes her morning flight
With an inimitable wing:
Through rifing deluges of dawning light
She cleaves her wondrous way,
She tunes immortal anthems to the growing day;
Nor Rapin gives her rules to fly, nor † Purcell notes to fing.
She nor inquires, nor knows, nor fears
Where lie the pointed rocks, or where th' ingulphing
Climbing the liquid mountains of the skies
She meets defcending angels as fhe flies,
Nor aíks them where their country lies,
Or where the fea-marks ftand.
Touch'd with an empyreal ray
She fprings, unerring, upward to eternal day,
Spreads her white fails aloft, and steers,
With bold and fafe attempt, to the celestial land.
A French Critick.
† An English master of muf.c.
Whilft little skiffs along the mortal hores
With humble toil in order creep,
Coafting in fight of one another's oars,
Nor venture through the boundless deep,
Such low pretending fouls are they
Who dwell inclos'd in folid orbs of skull;
Plodding along their fober way,
The snail o'ertakes them in their wildest play,
While the poor labourers fweat to be correctly dull.
Give me the chariot whofe diviner wheels
Mark their own rout, and unconfin'd
Bound o'er the everlasting hills,
And lofe the clouds below, and leave the ftars behind,
Give me the Mufe whofe generous force,
Impatient of the reins, Purfues an unattempted course,
Breaks all the criticks iron chains,
And bears to paradise the raptur'd mind.
There Milton dwells: The mortal fung
Themes not prefum'd by mortal tongue;
New terrors, or new glories, fhine
In every page, and flying fcenes divine
Surprize the wondering fenfe, and draw our fouls along.
Behold his Mufe fent out t' explore
The unapparent deep where waves of Chaos roar,
And realms of night unknown before.
She trac'd a glorious path unknown,
Through fields of heavenly war, and feraphs overthrown,
Where his adventurous genius led : Sovereign the fram`d a model of her own,
Nor thank'd the living nor the dead. The noble hater of degenerate rhyme
Shook off the chains, and built his verfe fublime,
A monument too high for coupled founds to climb.
He mourn'd the garden loft below;
(Earth is the scene for tuneful woe)
Now blifs beats high in all his veins,
Now the loft Eden he regains,
Keeps his own air, and triumphs in unrival'd strains.
Immortal bard! Thus thy own Raphael fings,
And knows no rule but native fire:
All heaven fits filent, while to his sovereign strings
He talks unutterable things;
With graces infinite his untaught fingers rove
Across the golden lyre:
From every note devotion fprings.
Rapture, and harmony, and love,
O'erspread the liftening choir.
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