HYMN ON SOLITUD E. HAIL, mildly pleasing Solitude, Oh! how I love with thee to walk, A thousand shapes you wear with ease, And still in every shape you please. Now wrapt in some mysterious dream, A lone philosopher you seem; Now quick from hill to vale you fly, And now you sweep the vaulted sky. A shepherd next, you haunt the plain, And warble forth your oaten strain :A lover now, with all the grace Of that sweet passion in your face: Then, calm'd to friendship, you assume The gentle-looking HARFORD's bloom, As, with her MUSIDORA, she (Her MUSIDORA fond of thee) Amid the long withdrawing vale, Awakes the rival'd nightingale. Thine is the balmy breath of morn, Just as the dew-bent rose is born; And while meridian fervors beat, Thine is the woodland dumb retreat; But chief, when evening scenes decay, And the faint landscape swims away, Thine is the doubtful soft decline, And that best hour of musing thine. Descending angels bless thy train, The virtues of the sage, and swain; Plain Innocence, in white array'd, Before thee lifts her fearless head: Religion's beams around thee shine, And cheer thy glooms with light divine: About thee sports sweet Liberty; And rapt Urania sings to thee. Oh, let me pierce thy secret cell, And in thy deep recesses dwell! I just may cast my careless eyes END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. S. Hamilton, Printer, Falcon-Court, Fleet-Street, London. |