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These are the sacred feelings of thy heart,
Thy heart inform'd by reason's purer ray,
O Lyttleton, the friend! thy passions thus
And meditations vary, as at large,
Courting the Muse, through Hagley Park thou
Thy British Temple! There along the dale, [stray'st;
With woods o'er-hung and shagg'd with inossy rocks,
Whence on each hand the gushing waters play,
And down the rough cascade white-dashing fall,
Or gleam in lengthen'd vista through the trees,
You silent steal; or sit beneath the shade
Of solemn oaks, that tuft the swelling mounts
Thrown graceful round by Nature's careless hand,
And pensive listen to the various voice

Of rural peace: the herds, the flocks, the birds,
The hollow-whispering breeze, the plaint of rills,
That, purling down amid the twisted roots
Which creep around, their dewy murmurs shake
On the sooth'd ear. From these abstracted oft,
You wander through the philosophic world;
Where in bright train continual wonders rise,
Or to the curious or the pious eyc.
And oft, conducted by historic truth,
You tread the long extent of backward time:
Planning, with warm benevolence of mind,
And honest zeal unwarp'd by party-rage,
Britannia's weal; how from the venal gulf
To raise her virtue, and her arts revive.

Or, turning thence thy view, these graver thoughts
The Muses charm: while, with sure taste refin'd,
You draw th' inspiring breath of ancient song;
Till nobly rises, emulous, thy own.
Perhaps thy lov'd Lucinda shares thy walk,
With soul to thine attun'd. Then Nature all
Wears to the lover's eye a look of love;
And all the tumult of a guilty world,
Tost by ungenerous passions, sinks away.
The tender heart is animated peace;
And as it pours its copious treasures forth,
In varied converse, softening every theme,
You, frequent pausing, turn, and from her eyes,
Where meeken'd sense, and amiable grace,
And lively sweetness dwell, enraptur'd, drink
That nameless spirit of ethereal joy,
Unutterable happiness! which love,
Alone, bestows, and on a favour'd few.
Meantime you gain the height, from whose fair brow
The bursting prospect spreads immense around:
And snatch'd o'er hill and dale, and wood and lawn,
And verdant field, and darkening heath between,
And villages embosom'd soft in trees,
And spiry towns by surging columns mark'd
Of household smoke, your eye cxcursive roams:
Wide-stretching from the hall, in whose kind haunt
The hospitable genius lingers still,

To where the broken landscape, by degrees,
Ascending, rougiens into rigid hills;
O'er which the Cambrian mountains, like far clouds
That skirt the blue horizon, dusky rise.

Flush'd by the spirit of the genial year,
Now from the virgin's cheek a fresher bloom
Shoots, less and less, the live carnation round;
Her lips blush deeper sweets; she breaths of youth;
The shining moisture swells into her eyes,
In brighter flow; her wishing bosom heaves
With palpitations wild; kind tumults seize
Her veins, and all her yielding soul is love.
From the keen gaze her lover turns away,
Full of the dear ecstatic power, and sick
With sighing languishment. Ah then, ye fair!

Be greatly cautious of your sliding hearts:
Dare not th' infectious sigh; the pleading look,
Downcast, and low, in meek subinission drest,
But full of guile. Let not the fervent tongue,
Prompt to deceive, with adulation smooth,
Gain on your purpos'd will. Nor in the bower,
Where woodbines flaunt, and roses shed a couch,
While Evening draws her crimson curtains round,
Trust your soft minutes with betraying man.

And let th' aspiring youth beware of love,
Of the smooth glance beware; for 'tis too late,
When on his heart the torrent-softness pours.
Then wisdom prostrate lies, and fading fame
Dissolves in air away: while the fond soul,
Wrapt in gay visions of unreal bliss,
Still paints th' illusive form; the kindling grace;
Th' inticing smile; the modest-seeming eye,
Beneath whose beauteous beams, belying heavèn,
Lurk searchless cunning, cruelty, and death:
And still false-warbling in his cheated ear,
Her syren voice, enchanting, draws him on
To guileful shores, and meads of fatal joy.
Ev'n present, in the very lap of love
Inglorious laid; while music flows around,
Perfumes, and oils, and wine, and wanton hours;
Amid the roses fierce Repentance rears
Her snaky crest: a quick returning pang
Shoots through the conscious heart, where honour
And great design, against the oppressive load
Of luxury, by fits, impatient heave.

[still,

But absent, what fantastic woes, arous'd, Rage in each thought, by restless musing fed, Chill the warm cheek, and blast the bloom of life? Neglected fortune flies; and sliding swift, Prone into ruin, fall his scorn'd affairs. 'Tis nought but gloom around: the darken'd Sun Loses his light. The rosy bosom'd Spring To weeping fancy pines; and yon bright arch, Contracted, bends into a dusky vault. All Nature fades extinct; and she alone Heard, felt, and seen, possesses every thought, Fills every sense, and pants in every vein. Books are but formal dulness, tedious friends; And sad amid the social band he sits, Lonely, and unattentive. From his tongue Th' unfinish'd period falls: while, borne away On swelling thought, his wafted spirit flies To the vain bosom of his distant fair; And leaves the semblance of a lover fix'd In melancholy site, with head declin'd, And love-dejected eyes. Sudden he starts, Shook from his tender trance, and restless runs To glimmering shades, and sympathetic glooms; Where the dun umbrage o'er the falling stream, Romantic, hangs; there through the pensive dusk Strays, in heart-thrilling meditation lost, Indulging all to love: or on the bank Thrown, amid drooping lilies, swells the breeze With sighs unceasing, and the brook with tears. Thus in soft anguish he consumes the day, Nor quits his deep retirement, till the Moon Peeps through the chambers of the fleecy east, Enlighten'd by degrees, and in her train Leads on the gentle hours; then forth he walks, Beneath the trembling languish of her beam, With soften'd soul, and wooes the bird of eve To mingle woes with his: or while the world And all the sons of care lie hush'd in sleep, Associates with the midnight shadows drear; And, sighing to the lonely taper, pours

His idly-tortur'd heart into the page,
Meant for the moving messenger of love;
Where rapture burns on rapture, every line
With rising frenzy fir'd. But if on bed
Delirious flung, sleep from his pillow flies,
All night he tosses, nor the balmy power
In any posture finds; till the grey morn
Lifts her pale lustre on the paler wretch,
Exanimate by love: and then perhaps
Exhausted nature sinks a while to rest,
Still interrupted by distracted dreams,
That o'er the sick imagination rise,

And in black colours paint the mimic scene.
Oft with th' enchantress of his soul he talks ;
Sometimes in crowds distress'd; or if retir'd
To secret winding flower-enwoven bowers,
Far from the dull impertinence of man,
Just as he, credulous, his endless cares
Begins to lose in blind oblivious love,
Snatched from her yielded band, he knows not how,
Through forests huge, and long untravel'd heaths
With desolation brown, he wanders waste,
In night and tempest wrapt; or shrinks aghast,
Back, from the bending precipice; or wades
The turbid stream below, and strives to reach
The farther shore; where succourless, and sad,
She with extended arms his aid implores;
But strives in vain: borne by th' outrageous flood
To distance down, he rides the ridgy wave,
Or whelm'd beneath the boiling eddy sinks.

These are the charming agonies of love,
Whose misery delights. But through the heart
Should jealousy its venom once diffuse,
'Tis then delightful misery no more,
But agony unmix'd, incessant gall,
Corroding every thought, and blasting all
Love's paradise. Ye fairy prospects, then,
Ye beds of roses, and ye bowers of joy,
Farewel! Ye gleamings of departed peace,
Shine out your last! The yellow-tinging plague
Internal vision taints, and in a night
Of livid gloom imagination wraps.
Ah, then instead of love-enliven'd cheeks,
Of sunny features, and of ardent eyes
With flowing rapture bright, dark looks succeed,
Suffus'd and glaring with untender fire;
A clouded aspect, and a burning cheek,
Where the whole poison'd soul, malignant, sits,
And frightens love away. Ten thousand fears
Invented wild, ten thousand frantic views
Of horrid rivals, hanging on the charms
For which he melts in fondness, eat him up
With fervent anguish, and consuming rage.
In vain reproaches lend their idle aid,
Deceitful pride, and resolution frail,
Giving false peace a moment. Fancy pours,
Afresh, her beauties on his busy thought,
Her first endearments twining round the soul,
With all the witchcraft of ensnaring love.
Straight the fierce storm involves his mind anew,
Flames through the nerves, and boils along the
veins;

While anxious doubt distracts the tortur'd heart:
For ev'n the sad assurance of his fears
Were ease to what he feels. Thus the warm youth,
Whom love deludes into his thorny wilds,
Through flowery-tempting paths, or leads a life
Of fever'd rapture, or of cruel care ;

His brightest flames extinguish'd all, and all His lively moments running down to waste.

But happy they! the happiest of their kind! Whom gentler stars unite, and in one fate Their hearts, their fortunes, and their beings blend. 'Tis not the coarser tie of human laws, Unnatural oft, and foreign to the mind, That binds their peace, but harmony itself, Attuning all their passions into love;

Where friendship full exerts her softest power,

Perfect esteem enliven'd by desire

Ineffable, and sympathy of soul;

Thought meeting thought, and will preventing will,

With boundless confidence: for nought but love Can answer love, and render bliss secure. Let hin, ungenerous, who, alone intent To bless himself, from sordid parents buys The loathing virgin, in eternal care, Well-merited, consume his nights and days : Let barbarous nations, whose inhuman love Is wild desire, fierce as the suns they feel; Let eastern tyrants, from the light of Heaven Seclude their bosom-slaves, meanly possess'd Of a mere, lifeless, violated form: While those whom love cements in holy faith, And equal transport, free as Nature live, Disdaining fear. What is the world to them, Its pomp, its pleasure, and its nonsense ail! Who in each other clasp whatever fair High fancy forms, and lavish hearts can wish; Something than beauty dearer, should they look Or on the mind, or mind-illumin'd face; Truth, goodness, honour, harmony, and love, The richest bounty of indulgent Heaven. Meantime a smiling offspring rises round, And mingles both their graces. By degrees, The human blossom blows: and every day, Soft as it rolls along, shows some new charm, The father's lustre, and the mother's bloom. Then infant reason grows apace, and calls For the kind hand of an assiduous care. Delightful task! to rear the tender thought, To teach the young idea how to shoot, To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind, To breathe th' enlivening spirit and to fix The generous purpose in the glowing breast. Oh, speak the joy! ye whom the sudden tear Surprises often, while you look around, And nothing strikes your eye but sights of bliss, All various nature pressing on the heart : An elegant sufficiency, content, Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books, Ease and alternate labour, useful life, Progressive virtue, and approving Heaven. These are the matchless joys of virtuous love; And thus their moments fly. The seasons thus, As ceaseless round a jarring world they roll, Still find them happy; and consenting Spring Sheds her own rosy garland on their heads: Till evening comes at last, serene and mild; When, after the long vernal day of life, Enamour'd more, as more remembrance swells With many a proof of recollected love, Together down they sink in social sleep; Together freed, their gentle spirits fly To scenes where love and bliss immortal reign.

SUMMER. 1727.

ARGUMENT.

The subject proposed. Invocation. Address to Mr.
Doddington. An introductory reflection on the
motion of the heavenly bodies; whence the suc-
cession of the Seasons. As the face of Nature in this
season is almost uniform, the progress of the poem
is a description of a summer's day. The dawn.
Sun-rising. Hymn to the Sun. Forenoon. Sum-
mer insects described. Hay-making. Sheep-
shearing. Noon-day. A woodland retreat.-
Groupe of herds and flocks. A solemn grove :
how it affects a cont mplative mind,
taract, and rude scene. View of Summer in
Storm of thunder and light-
ning. A tale. The storm over, a serene after-
noon. Bathing. Hour of walking. Transition
to the prospect of a rich well-cultivated country;
which introduces a panegyric on Great Britain.
Sun-set. Evening. Night, Summer meteors.
A comet. The whole concluding with the praise
of philosophy.

the torrid zone.

A ca

FROM brightening fields of ether fair disclos'd,
Child of the Sun, refulgent Summer comes,
In pride of youth, and felt through Nature's depth:
He comes attended by the sultry hours,
And ever-fanning breezes, on his way;
While from his ardent look, the turning Spring
Averts her blushful face; and earth and skies,
All smiling, to his hot dominion leaves.

Hence, let me haste into the mid-wood shade, Where scarce a sun-beam wanders through the gloom;

And on the dark green grass, beside the brink
Of haunted stream, that by the roots of oak
Rolls o'er the rocky channel, lie at large,
And sing the glories of the circling year.

Come, Inspiration! from thy hermit seat,
By mortal seldom found: may fancy dare,
From thy fix'd serious eye, and raptur'd glance
Shot on surrounding Heaven, to steal one look
Creative of the poet, every power
Exalting to an extasy of soul.

And thou, my youthful Muse's early friend,
In whom the human graces all unite :
Pure light of mind, and tenderness of heart;
Genius, and wisdom; the gay social sense,
By decency chastis'd; goodness and wit,
In seldom-meeting harmony combin'd;
Unblemish'd honour, and an active zeal
For Britain's glory, liberty, and man;
O Doddington! attend my rural song,
Stoop to my theme, inspirit every line,
And teach me to deserve thy just applause.

With what an aweful world-revolving power
Were first th' unwieldy planets lanch'd along
Th' illimitable void! Thus to remain,
Amid the flux of many thousand years,
That oft has swept the toiling race of men,
And all their labour'd monuments away.
Firm, unremitting, matchless, in their course;

To the kind-temper'd change of night and day,
And of the seasons ever stealing round,

Minutely faithful: such th' all-perfect Hand!
That pois'd, impels, and rules the steady whole.

When now no more th' alternate Twins are fir'd,
And Cancer reddens with the solar blaze,
Short is the doubtful empire of the night;
And soon, observant of approaching day,
The meek-ey'd morn appears, mother of dews,
At first faint-gleaming in the dappled east :
Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glow;
And, from before the lustre of her face,
White break the clouds away. With quicken'd step,
Brown night retires: young day pours in apace,
And opens all the lawny prospect wide.
Swell on the sight, and brighten with the dawn,
The dripping rock, the mountain's misty top
Blue, through the dusk, the smoaking currents
And from the bladed field the fearful hare [shine;
Limps, awkward; while along the forest-glade
The wild deer trip, and often turning gaze
The native voice of undissembled joy ;
At early passenger. Music awakes
Rous'd by the cock, the soon-clad shepherd leaves
And thick around the woodland hymns arise.
His mossy cottage, where with Peace he dwells;
His flock to taste the verdure of the morn.
And from the crowded fold, in order, drives

Falsely luxurious, will not man awake;
And, springing from the bed of sloth, enjoy
The cool, she fragrant, and the silent hour,
To meditation due and sacred song?

For is there ought in sleep can charm the wise?
To lie in dead oblivion, losing half

The fleeting moments of too short a life;
Total extinction of the enlighten'd soul!
Or else to feverish vanity alive,

Wilder'd, and tossing through distemper'd dreams?
Who would in such a gloomy state remain
And every blooming pleasure wait without,
Longer than nature craves; when every Muse
To bless the wildly devious morning walk?

But yonder comes the powerful king of day,
Rejoicing in the east. The lessening cloud,
The kindling azure, and the mountain's brow
Illum'd with fluid gold, his near approach
Betoken glad. Lo!' now, apparent all,
Aslant the dew-bright Earth, aud colour'd air,
He looks in boundless majesty abroad;
And sheds the shining day, that burnish'd plays
On rocks, and hills, and towers, and wandering
streams,

High gleaming from afar. Prime cheerer Light!
Of all material beings first, and best!
Efflux divine; Nature's resplendent robe !
Without whose vesting beauty all were wrapt
In unessential gloom; and thou, O Sun!
Soul of surrounding worlds! in whom best seen
Shines out thy Maker! may I sing of thee?

"Tis by thy secret, strong, attractive force,
As with a chain indissoluble bound,
Thy system rolls entire; from the far bourne
Of utmost Saturn, wheeling wide his round-
Of thirty years; to Mercury, whose disk
Can scarce be caught by philosophic-eye,
Lost in the near effulgence of thy blaze.

Informer of the planetary train!
Without whose quickening glance their cumbrous
Were brute unlovely mass, inert and dead, [orbs
And not, as now, the green abodes of life!
How many forms of being wait on thee!
Inhaling spirit; from th' unfetter'd mind,

By thee sublim'd, down to the daily race, The mixing myriads of thy setting beam.

The vegetable world is also thine, Parent of Seasons! who the pomp precede

From mortal eye, or angel's purer ken ; Whose single smile has, from the first of time, Fill'd o'erflowing, all those lamps of Heaven, That beam for ever through the boundless sky :

That waits thy throne, as through thy vast do- But, should he hide his face, th' astonish'd Sun,

main,

Annual, along the bright ecliptic road,
In world-rejoicing state, it moves sublime.
Mean-time th' expecting nations, circled gay
With all the various tribes of foodful earth,
Implore thy bounty, or send grateful up

A common hymn: while, round thy beaming car,
High-seen, the Seasons lead, in sprightly dance
Harmonious knit, the rosy-finger'd Hours,
The Zephyrs floating loose, the timely Rains,
Of bloom ethereal the light-footed Dews,
And soften'd into joy the surly storms.
These, in successive turn, with lavish hand,
Shower every beauty, every fragrance shower,
Herbs, flowers, and fruits; till kindling at thy
touch,

From land to land is flush'd the vernal year.
Nor to the surface of enliven'd Earth,
Graceful with hills and dales, and leafy woods,
Her liberal tresses, is thy force confir'd:
But to the bowel'd cavern darting deep,
The mineral kinds confess thy mighty power.
Effulgent, hence the veiny marble shines;
Hence labour draws his tools; hence burnish'd War
Gleams on the day; the nobler works of Peace
Hence bless mankind, and generous Commerce
The round of nations in a golden chain. [binds

Th' unfruitful rock itself, impregn'd by thee,
In dark retirement forms the lucid stone.
The lively diamond drinks thy purest rays,
Collected light, compact; that, polish'd bright,
And all its native lustre let abroad,
Dares, as it sparkles on the fair-one's breast,
With vain ambition emulate her eyes.
At thee the ruby lights its deepening glow,
And with a waving radiance inward flames.
From thee the sapphire, solid ether, takes
Its hue cerulean; and, of evening tinct,
The purple-streaming amethyst is thine.
With thy own smile the yellow topaz burns,
Nor deeper verdure dyes the robe of Spring,
When first she gives it to the southern gale,
Than the green emerald shows. But, all combin'd,
Thick through the whitening opal play thy beams;
Or, flying several from its surface, form
A trembling variance of revolving hues,
As the site varies in the gazer's hand.

The very dead creation, from thy touch,
Assumes a mimic life. By thee refin'd,
In brighter mazes the relucent stream
Plays o'er the mead. The precipice abrupt,
Projecting horrour on the blacken'd flood,
Softens at thy return. The desert joys
Wildly, through all his melancholy bounds.
Rude ruins glitter; and the briny deep,
Seen from some pointed promontory's top,
Far to the blue horizon's utmost verge,
Restless, reflects a floating gleam. But this,
And all the much-transported Muse can sing,
Are to thy beauty, dignity, and use,
Unequal far; great delegated source
Of light, and life, and grace, and joy below!
How shall I then attempt to sing of Him!
Who, Light himself, in uncreated light
Invested deep, dwells awefully retir'd

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And all the extinguish'd stars, would loosening reel Wide from their spheres, and Chaos come again.

And yet was every faultering tongue of man,
Almighty Father! silent in thy praise,
Thy works themselves would raise a general voice,
Ev'n in the depth of solitary woods

By human foot untrod; proclaim thy power,
And to the quire celestial thee resound,
Th' eternal cause, support, and end of all!
To me be Nature's volume broad-display'd;
And to peruse its all-instructing page,
Or, haply catching inspiration thence,
Some easy passage, raptur'd to translate;
My sole delight, as through the falling glooms
Pensive I stray, or with the rising dawn
On fancy's eagle-wing excursive soar.

Now flaming up the Heavens, the potent-Sun
Melts into limpid air the high-rais'd clouds,
And morning fogs that hover'd round the hills
In party-colour'd bands; till wide unveil'd
The face of Nature shines, from where Earth seems,
Far stretch'd around, to meet the bending sphere.
'Half in a blush of clustering roses lost,
Dew-dropping Coolness to the shade retires;
There, on the verdant turf, or flowery bed,
By gelid founts and careless rills to muse;
While tyrant Heat, dispreading through the sky,
With rapid sway, his burning influence darts
On man, and beast, and herb, and tepid stream.
Who can unpitying see the flowery race,
Shed by the morn, their new-flush'd bloom resign,
Before the parching beam? So fade the fair,
When fevers revel through their azure veins.
But one, the lofty follower of the Sun,
Sad when he sits, shuts up her yellow leaves,
Drooping all night; and, when he warm returns,
Points her enamour'd bosom to his ray. [retreats;
Home, from his morning task, the swain
His flock before him stepping to the fold:
While the full-udder'd mother lows around
The cheerful cottage, then expecting food,
The food of innocence and health! The daw,
The rook and magpie, to the grey-grown oaks
That the calm village in their verdant arms,
Sheltering, embrace, direct their lazy flight;
Where on the mingling boughs they sit embower'd,
All the hot noon, till cooler hours arise.
Faint, underneath, the household fowls convene ;
And, in a corner of the buzzing shade,
The house-dog, with the vacant greyhound, lies,
Out-stretch'd, and sleepy. In his slumbers, one
Attacks the nightly thief, and one exults
O'er hill and dale; till, waken'd by the wasp,
They starting snap. Nor shall the Muse disdain
To let the little noisy summer-race

Live in her lay, and flutter through her song:
Not mean, though simple; to the Sun ally'd,
From him they draw their animating fire.

Wak'd by his warmer ray, the reptile young
Come wing'd abroad; by the light air upborn,
Lighter, and full of soul. From every chink,
And secret corner, where they slept away
The wintery storms; or rising from their tombs,
To higher life; by myriads, forth at once,
Swarming they pour; of all the vary'd hues

Their beauty-beaming parent can disclose.
Ten thousand forms! ten thousand different tribes!
People the blaze. To sunny waters some
By fatal instinct fly; where on the pool
They, sportive, wheel; or, sailing down the stream,
Are snatch'd immediate by the quick-ey'd trout,
Or darting salmon. Through the green-wood glade
Some love to stray; there lodg'd, amus'd and fed,
In the fresh leaf. Luxurious, others make
The meads their choice, and visit every flower,
And every latent herb: for the sweet task,
To propagate their kinds, and where to wrap,
In what soft beds, their young yet undisclos'd,
Employs their tender care. Some to the house,
The fold, and dairy, hungry, bend their flight;
Sip round the pail, or taste the curdling cheese :
Oft, inadvertent, from the milky stream
They meet their fate; or, weltering in the bowl,
With powerless wings around them wrapt, expire.
But chief to heedless flies the window proves
A constant death; where, gloomily retir'd,
The villain spider lives, cunning, and fierce,
Mixture abborr'd! Amid a mangled heap
Of carcases, in eager watch he sits,
O'erlooking all his waving snares around.
Near the dire cell the dreadless wanderer oft
Passes, as oft the ruffian shows his front;
The prey at last ensnar'd, he dreadful darts,
With rapid glide, along the leaning line;
And, fixing in the wretch his cruel fangs,
Strikes backward grimly pleas'd: the fluttering wing
And shriller sound declare extreme distress,
And ask the helping hospitable hand.

Resounds the living surface of the ground:
Nor undelightful is the ceaseless hum,

To him who muses through the woods at noon:
Or drowsy shepherd, as he lies reclin'd,
With half-shut eyes, beneath the floating shade
Of willows grey, close-crowding o'er the brook.

Gradual, from these what numerous kinds
Evading ev'n the microscopic eye! [descend,
Full Natore swarms with life; one wondrous mass
Of animals, or atoms organiz'd,
Waiting the vital Breath, when Parent-Heaven
Shall bid his spirit blow. The hoary fen,
In putrid steams, emits the living cloud
Of pestilence. Through subterranean cells,

Where searching sun-beams scarce can find a way,
Earth animated heaves. The flowery leaf
Wants not its soft inhabitants. Secure,
Within its winding citadel, the stone
Holds multitudes. But chief the forest-boughs,
That dance unnumber'd to the playful breeze,
The downy orchard, and the melting pulp
Of mellow fruit, the nameless nations feed
Of evanescent insects. Where the pool
Stands mantled o'er with green, invisible,
Amid the floating verdure millions stray.
Each liquid too, whether it pierces, sooths,
Inflames, refreshes, or exalts the taste,
With various forms abounds. Nor is the stream
Of purest crystal, nor the lucid air,
Though one transparent vacancy it seems,
Void of their unseen people. These, conceal'd
By the kind art of forming Heaven, escape
The grosser eye of man: for, if the worlds
In worlds enclos'd should on his senses burst,
From cates ambrosial, and the nectar'd bowl,
He would abhorrent turn; and in dead night,
When silence sleeps o'er all, be stunn'd with noise.

Let no presuming impious railer tax
Creative Wisdom, as if aught was form'd
In vain, or not for admirable ends.
Shall little haughty Ignorance pronounce
His works unwise, of which the smallest part
Exceeds the narrow vision of her mind?
As if upon a full-proportion'd dome,
On swelling columns heav'd, the pride of art!
A critic fly, whose feeble ray scarce spreads
An inch around, with blind presumption bold,
Should dare to tax the structure of the whole.
And lives the man, whose universal eye
Has swept at once th' unbounded scheme of things;
Mark'd their dependence so, and firm accord,
As with unfaultering accent to conclude
That this availeth nought? Has any seen
The mighty chain of beings, lessening down
From Infinite Perfection to the brink
Of dreary nothing, desolate abyss!

From which astonish'd thought, recoiling, turns?
Till then alone let zealous praise ascend.
And hymns of holy wonder, to that Power
Whose wisdom shines as lovely on our minds,
As on our sailing eyes his servant Sun.

Thick in yon stream of light, a thousand ways,
Upward, and downward, thwarting, and convolv ́d,
The quivering nations sport; till, tempest-wing'd,
Fierce Winter sweeps them from the face of day.
Ev'n so luxurious men, unheeding, pass
An idle summer life in fortune's shine,
A season's glitter! Thus they flatter on
From toy to toy, from vanity to vice;
Till, blown away by Death, Oblivion comes
Behind, and strikes them from the book of life.

Now swarms the village o'er the jovial mead : The rustic youth, brown with meridian toil, Healthful and strong; full as the summer rose Blown by prevailing suns, the ruddy maid, Half naked, swelling on the sight, and all Her kindled graces, burning o'er her check. Ev'n stooping age is here: and infant-hands Trail the long rake, or, with the fragrant load O'ercharg'd, amid the kind oppression roll. Wide flies the tedded grain; all in a row Advancing broad, or wheeling round the field, They spread their breathing harvest to the Sun, That throws refreshful round a rural smell: Or, as they rake the green-appearing ground, And drive the dusky wave along the mead, The russet hay-cock rises thick behind, In order gay. While, heard from dale to dale, Waking the breeze, resounds the blended voice Of happy labour, love, and social glee.

Or rushing thence, in one diffusive band, They drive the troubled flocks, by many a dog Compell'd, to where the mazy-running brook Forms a deep pool; this bank abrupt and high, And that fair spreading in a pebbled shore. Urg'd to the giddy brink, much is the toil, The clamour much, of men, and boys, and dogs, Ere the soft fearful people to the flood Commit their woolly sides. And oft the swain, On some impatient seizing, hurls them in; Embolden'd then, nor hesitating more, Fast, fast, they plunge amid the flashing wave, And panting labour to the farthest shore. Repeated this, till deep the well-wash'd fleece Has drunk the flood, and from his lively haunt The trout is banish'd by the sordid stream; Heavy, and dripping, to the breezy brow

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