Nor guardian law were his; nor various skill
To turn the furrow, or to guide the tool
Mechanic; nor the heaven-conducted prow
Of navigation bold, that fearless braves
The burning line, or dares the wintery pole ;
Mother fevere of infinite delights!

Nothing, fave rapine, indolence, and guile,
And woes on woes, a still-revolving train !
Whose horrid circle had made human life
Than non-existence worse: but, taught by thee,
Ours are the plans of policy and peace ;
To live like brothers, and conjunctive all
Embellish life. While thus laborious crowds
Ply the tough oar, Philofophy directs

1765

1770

1775

The ruling helm; or like the liberal breath

Of potent heaven, invifible, the fail

Swells out, and bears th' inferior world along.

1780

Of the Sole Being right, who spoke the Word,

And Nature mov'd complete. With inward view,
Thence on th' ideal kingdom fwift she turns
Her eye; and inftant, at her powerful glance,
Th' obedient phantoms vanish or appear;
Compound, divide, and into order shift,
Each to his rank, from plain perception up
To the fair forms of Fancy's fleeting train:

1790

Το

To reafon then, deducing truth from truth;
And notion quite abstract; where first begins
The world of fpirits, action all, and life
Unfetter'd, and unmixt. But here the cloud,
So wills Eternal Providence, fits deep.
Enough for us to know that this dark state,
In wayward paffions loft, and vain pursuits,
This Infancy of Being, cannot prove
The final iffue of the works of God,

By boundless Love and perfect Wisdom form'd,
And ever rifing with the rifing mind.

1795

1800

AUTUM N.

AUTUM M N. 1730.

THE

ARGUMENT.

The fubject propofed. Addreffed to Mr. Onflow. A profpect of the fields ready for harvest. Reflections in praise of industry raised by that view. Reaping. A tale relative to it. A harvest-ftorm. Shooting and hunting, their barbarity. A ludicrous account of fox-hunting. A view of an orchard. Wall-fruit. A vineyard. A defcription of fogs, frequent in the latter part of Autumn: whence a digreffion, enquiring into the rise of fountains and rivers. Birds of feafon confidered, that now shift their habitation. The prodigious number of them that cover the northern and western ifles of Scotland. Hence a view of the country. A profpect of the difcoloured, fading woods. After a gentle dufky day, moon-light. Autumnal meteors. Morning: to which fucceeds a calm, pure, fun-shiny day, such as ufually shuts up the feafon. The harvest being gathered-in, the country diffolved in joy. The whole concludes with a panegyric on a philosophical country life.

CROWN'D with the fickle and the wheaten fheaf,

While Autumn, nodding o'er the yellow plain,

Comes jovial on; the Doric reed once more,

Well

Well pleas'd, I tune. Whate'er the Wintery frost
Nitrous prepar'd; the various-bloffom'd Spring
Put in white promife forth; and Summer funs
Concocted strong, rush boundless now to view,
Full, perfect all, and fwell my glorious theme.
Onflow! the Mufe, ambitious of thy name,
To grace, inspire, and dignify her fong,

Would from the Public Voice thy gentle ear
A while engage. Thy noble care fhe knows,
The patriot virtues that diftend thy thought,
Spread on thy front, and in thy bofom glow;
While liftening fenates hang upon thy tongue,
Devolving through the maze of eloquence
A roll of periods sweeter than her song.
But the too pants for public virtue; she,
Though weak of power, yet strong in ardent will,
Whene'er her country rushes on her heart,
Affumes a bolder note, and fondly tries

To mix the patriot's with the poet's flame.

When the bright Virgin gives the beauteous days, And Libra weighs in equal scales the year;

From heaven's high cope the fierce effulgence fhook 25 Of parting fummer, a ferener blue,

With golden light enliven'd, wide invests

The happy world. Attemper'd funs arise,

Sweet-beam'd, and fhedding oft through lucid clouds.
A pleasing calm; while broad, and brown, below 30
Extenfive harvefts hang the heavy head.

Rich, filent, deep, they stand; for not a gale
Rolls its light billows o'er the bending plain :

A calm

A calm of plenty till the ruffled air

Falls from its poife, and gives the breeze to blow.
Rent is the fleecy mantle of the sky;

35

The clouds fly different; and the fudden fun
By fits effulgent gilds th' illumin'd field,
And black by fits the shadows sweep along.
A gaily-checker'd heart-expanding view,
Far as the circling eye can fhoot around,
Unbounded toffing in a flood of corn.

These are thy bleffings, Industry! rough power;
Whom labour still attends, and sweat, and pain;
Yet the kind fource of every gentle art,

And all the foft civility of life:

Raifer of human-kind! by Nature caft,
Naked, and helpless, out amid the woods
And wilds, to rude inclement elements ;
With various feeds of art deep in the mind
Implanted, and profufely pour'd around
Materials infinite; but idle all.

Still unexerted, in th' unconscious breaft,
Slept the lethargic powers; corruption still,
Voracious, swallow'd'what the liberal hand
Of bounty scatter'd o'er the favage year:
And still the fad barbarian, roving, mix'd
With beafts of prey; or for his acorn-meal

40

45

50

55

Fought the fierce tufky boar; a shivering wretch!
Aghaft, and comfortless, when the bleak north,
With winter charg'd, let the mix'd tempeft fly,

60

Hail, rain, and snow, and bitter-breathing froft:
Then to the shelter of the hut he fled;

And