Then shall my jocund harp, attun'd To thy true ear, with sweeter sound Pursue the free Horatian song: Old Tyne shall listen to my tale, And Echo down the bordering vale The liquid melody prolong.

ODE III.

TO A FRIEND,

UNSUCCESSFUL IN LOVE.

INDEED, my Phædria, if to find

That wealth can female wishes gain,
Had e'er disturb'd your thoughtful mind,
Or cost one serious moment's pain,
I should have said that all the rules,
You learn'd of moralists and schools,
Were very useless, very vain.

Yet I perhaps mistake the case—
Say, though with this heroic air,
Like one that holds a nobler chase,
You try the tender loss to bear,
Does not your heart renounce your tongue?
Seerns not my censure strangely wrong

To count it such a slight affair?

When Hesper gilds the shaded sky,

Oft as you seek the well-known grove, Methinks I see you cast your eye

Back to the morning scenes of love: Each pleasing word you heard her say, Her gentle look, her graceful way,'

Again your struggling fancy move.

Then tell me, is your soul entire?

Does Wisdom calmly hold her throne? Then can you question each desire,

Bid this remain, and that begone? No tear half-starting from your eye? No kindling blush you know not why? No stealing sigh, nor stifled groan?

Away with this unmanly mood!

See where the hoary churl appears,
Whose hand hath seiz'd the favourite good
Which you reserv'd for happier years:
While, side by side, the blushing maid
Shrinks from his visage, half afraid,
Spite of the sickly joy she wears.

Ye guardian powers of love and fame,
This chaste, harmonious pair behold;
And thus reward the generous flame
Of all who barter vows for gold.
O bloom of youth, O tender charms
Well buried in a dotard's arms!
O equal price of beauty sold!

Cease then to gaze with looks of love :
Bid her adieu, the venal fair:
Unworthy she your bliss to prove ;

Then wherefore should she prove your care?
No: lay your myrtle garland down;
And let a while the willow's crown
With luckier omens bind your hair.

O just escap'd the faithless main,

Though driven unwilling on the land; To guide your favour'd steps again,

Behold your better genius stand: Where Truth revolves her page divine, Where Virtue leads to Honour's shrine, Behold, he lifts his awful hand.

Fix but on these your ruling aim, And Time, the sire of manly Care, Will Fancy's dazzling colours tame,

A soberer dress will Beauty wear: Then shall Esteem, by Knowledge led, Enthrone within your heart and head Some happier love, some truer fair.

ODE IV.

AFFECTED INDIFFERENCE.

TO THE SAME.

YES, you contemn the perjur'd maid,
Who all your favourite hopes betray'd:
Nor, though her heart should home return,
Her tuneful tongue its falsehood mourn,
Her winning eyes your faith implore,
Would you her hand receive again,
At once dissemble your disdain,
Or listen to the syren's theme,

Or stoop to love: since now esteem,
And confidence, and friendship, is no more.

Yet tell me, Phædria, tell me why,
When, summoning your pride, you try
To meet her looks with cool neglect,
Or cross her walk with slight respect,
(For so is falsehood best repaid)
Whence do your cheeks indignant glow?
Why is your struggling tongue so slow?
What means that darkness on your brow
As if with all her broken vow

You meant the fair apostate to upbraid?

ODE V.

AGAINST SUSPICION.

On fly! 'tis dire Suspicion's mien ;
And, meditating plagues unseen,
The sorceress hither bends;
Behold her torch in gall imbrued:
Behold-her garment drops with blood
Of lovers and of friends.

Fly far! already in your eyes
I see a pale suffusion rise;

And soon through every vein,
Soon will her secret venom spread,
And all your heart, and all your head,
Imbibe the potent stain.

Then many a demon will she raise
To vex your sleep, to haunt your ways;
While gleams of lost delight
Raise the dark tempest of the brain,
As lightning shines across the main

Through whirlwinds and through night.

No more can faith or candour move; But each ingenuous deed of love,

Which reason would applaud, Now, smiling o'er her dark distress, Fancy malignant strives to dress

Like Injury and Fraud.

Farewell to Virtue's peaceful times: Soon will you stoop to act the crimes

Which thus you stoop to fear: Guilt follows guilt: and where the train Begins with wrongs of such a stain,

What horrours form the rear!

'Tis thus to work her baleful power, Suspicion waits the sullen hour

Of fretfulness and strife, When care the infirmer bosom wrings, Or Eurus waves his murky wings To damp the seats of life.

But come, forsake the scene unbless'd,
Which first beheld your faithful breast

To groundless fears a prey:
Come, where with my prevailing lyre
The skies, the streams, the groves conspire
To charm your doubts away.

Thron'd in the Sun's descending car,
What power unseen diffuseth far
This tenderness of mind?
What genius smiles on yonder flood?
What god, in whispers from the wood,
Bids every thought be kind?

O thou, whate'er thy awful name,
Whose wisdom our untoward frame

With social love restrains;
Thou, who by fair Affection's ties
Giv'st us to double all our joys,
And half disarm our pains.

Let universal candour still,
Clear as yon heaven-reflecting rill,
Preserve my open mind;

Nor this nor that man's crooked ways.
One sordid doubt within me raise
To injure human kind.

ODE VI.

HYMN TO CHEERFULNESS. How thick the shades of evening close! How pale the sky with weight of snows! Haste, light the tapers, urge the fire, And bid the joyless day retire.

-Alas! in vain I try within To brighten the dejected scene, While rous'd by grief these fiery pains Tear the frail texture of my veins; While Winter's voice, that storms around, And yon deep death-bell's groaning sound Renew my mind's oppressive gloom, Till starting horrour shakes the room. Is there in Nature no kind power To sooth Affliction's lonely hour? To blunt the edge of dire Disease,

And teach these wintery shades to please?

Come, Cheerfulness, triumphant fair,
Shine through the hovering cloud of care;
O sweet of language, mild of mien,
O Virtue's friend and Pleasure's queen,
Assuage the flames that burn my breast,
Compose my jarring thoughts to rest;
And while thy gracious gifts I feel,
My song shall all thy praise reveal.

As once ('twas in Astræa's reign)
The vernal powers renew'd their train,
It happen'd that immortal Love
Was ranging through the spheres above,
And downward hither cast his eye
The year's returning pomp to spy,
He saw the radiant god of day,
Waft in his car the rosy May;
The fragrant Airs and genial Hours
Were shedding round him dews and flowers;
Before his wheels Aurora pass'd,
And Hesper's golden lamp was last.
But, fairest of the blooming throng,
When Health majestic mov'd along,
Delighted to survey below

The joys which from her presence flow,
While Earth enliven'd hears her voice,
And swains, and flocks, and fields rejoice;
Then mighty Love her charms confess'd,
And soon his vows inclin'd her breast,
And, known from that auspicious morn,
Thee, pleasing Cheerfulness, was born.

Thou, Cheerfulness, by Heaven design'd
To sway the movements of the mind,
Whatever fretful passion springs,
Whatever wayward fortune brings
To disarrange the power within,
And strain the musical machine;
Thou, goddess, thy attempering hand
Doth each discordant string command,
Refines the soft, and swells the strong;
And, joining Nature's general song,
Through many a varying tone unfolds
The harmony of human souls.

Fair guardian of domestic life,
Kind banisher of homebred strife,
Nor sullen lip, nor taunting eye,
Deforms the scene where thou art by:
No sickening husband damns the hour
Which bound his joys to female power;
No pining mother weeps the cares
Which parents waste on thankless heirs :
The officious daughters pleas'd attend;
The brother adds the name of friend:
By thee with flowers their board is crown'd,
With songs from thee their walks resound
And morn with welcome lustre shines,
And evening unperceiv'd declines.

Is there a youth, whose anxious heart
Labours with love's unpitied smart?
Though now he stray by rills and bowers,
And weeping waste the lonely hours,
Or if the nymph her audience deign,
Debase the story of his pain
With slavish looks, discolour'd eyes,
And accents faltering into sighs;
Yet thou, auspicious power, with ease
Canst yield him happier arts to please,
Inform his mien with manlier charms,
Instruct his tongue with noble arms,
With more commanding passion move,
And teach the dignity of love.

Friend to the Muse and all her train, For thee I court the Muse again: The Muse for thee may well exert Her pomp, her charms, her fondest art, Who owes to thee that pleasing sway Which Earth and peopled Heaven obey. Let Melancholy's plaintive tongue Repeat what later bards have sung; But thine was Homer's ancient might, And thine victorious Pindar's flight: Thy hand each Lesbian wreath attir'd; Thy lip Sicilian reeds inspir'd: Thy spirit len the glad perfume Whence yet the flowers of Teos bloom; Whence yet from Tibur's sabine vale Delicious blows the enlivening gale, While Horace calls thy sportive choir, Heroes and nymphs, around his lyre.

But see where yonder pensive sage (A prey perhaps to Fortune's rage, Perhaps by tender griefs oppress'd, Or blooms congenial to his breast) Retires in desert scenes to dwell, And bids the joyless world farewell. Alone he treads the autumnal shade, Alone beneath the mountain laid He sees the nightly damps ascend And gathering storms aloft impend; He hears the neighbouring surges roll, And raging thunders shake the pole: Then, struck by every object round, And stunn'd by every horrid sound, He asks a clue for Nature's ways; But evil haunts him through the maze: He sees ten thousand demons rise To wield the empire of the skies, And Chance and Fate assume the rod, And Malice blot the throne of God. -O thou, whose pleasing power I sing, Thy lenient influence hither bring; Compose the storm, dispel the gloom, Till Nature wear her wonted bloom, Till fields and shades their sweets exhale, And music swell each opening gale: Then o'er his breast thy softness pour, And let him learn the timely hour To trace the world's benignant laws, And judge of that presiding cause, Who founds on discord Beauty's reign, Converts to pleasure every pain, Subdues each hostile form to rest, And bids the universe be bless'd.

O thou whose pleasing power I sing, If right I touch the votive string, If equal praise I yield thy name, Still govern thou thy poet's flame: Still with the Muse my bosom share, And sooth to peace intruding Care. But most exert thy pleasing power On Friendship's consecrated hour; And while my Sophron points the road To godlike Wisdom's calm abode, Or warm in Freedom's ancient cause Traceth the source of Albion's laws, Add thou o'er all the generous toil The light of thy unclouded smile. But, if by Fortune's stubborn sway, From him and Friendship torn away, I court the Muse's healing spell

For griefs that still with absence dwell,

Do thou conduct my fancy's dreams
To such indulgent placid themes,
As just the struggling breast may cheer,
And just suspend the starting tear,
Yet leave that sacred sense of woe
Which none but friends and lovers know.

ODE VII.

ON THE USE OF POETRY.

NOT for themselves did human kind
Contrive the parts by Heaven assign'd
On life's wide scene to play:
Not Scipio's force, nor Cæsar's skill
Can conquer Glory's arduous hill,
If Fortune close the way.

Yet still the self-depending soul,
Though last and least in Fortune's roll,
His proper sphere commands;
And knows what Nature's seal bestow'd,
And sees, before the throne of God,

The rank in which he stands.

Who train'd by laws the future age,
Who rescued nations from the rage
Of partial, factious power,
My heart with distant homage views;
Content if thou, celestial Muse,

Didst rule my natal hour.

Not far beneath the hero's feet,
Nor from the legislator's seat

Stands far remote the bard.
Though not with public terrours crown'd,
Yet wider shall his rule be found,
More lasting his award.

Lycurgus fashion'd Sparta's fame,
And Pompey to the Roman name
Gave universal sway:
Where are they?-Homer's reverend page
Holds empire to the thirtieth age,

And tongues and climes obey.

And thus when William's acts divine
No longer shall from Bourbon's line
Draw one vindictive vow;
When Sidney shall with Cato rest,
And Russel move the patriot's breast
No more than Brutus now:

Yet then shall Shakspeare's powerful art
O'er every passion, every heart,
Confirm his awful throne:
Tyrants shall bow before his laws;
And Freedom's, Glory's, Virtue's cause,
Their dread assertor own.

ODE VIII

ON LEAVING HOLLAND.

FAREWELL to Leyden's lonely bound, The Belgian Muse's sober seat; Where, dealing frugal gifts around To all the favourites at her feet,

She trains the body's bulky frame For passive, persevering toils; And lest, from any prouder aim, The daring mind should scorn her homely spoils, She breathes maternal fogs to damp its restless flame.

Farewell the grave, pacific air,

Where never mountain zephyr blew :
The marshy levels lank and bare,

Which Pan, which Ceres never knew:
The Naiads, with obscene attire,

Urging in vain their urns to flow;
While round them chant the croking choir,
And haply soothe some lover's prudent woe,
Or prompt some restive bard, and modulate his lyre.

Farewell, ye nymphs, whom sober care of gain Snatch'd in your cradles from the god of love:

She render'd all his boasted arrows vain;

And all his gifts did he in spite remove. Ye too, the slow-ey'd fathers of the land, With whom dominion steals from hand to hand, Unown'd, undignify'd by public choice, I go where Liberty to all is known, And tells a monarch on his throne, He reigns not but by her preserving voice.

II.

O my lov'd England, when with thee
Shall I sit down, to part no more?
Far from this pale, discolour'd sea,
That sleeps upon the reedy shore,
When shall I plough thy azure tide?

When on thy hills the flocks admire,
Like mountain snows; till down their side
I trace the village and the sacred spire, [vide.
While bowers and copses green the golden slope di-

Ye nymphs, who guard the pathless grove,
Ye blue-ey'd sisters of the streams,
With whom I wont at morn to rove,

With whom at noon I talk'd in dreams:
O! take me to your haunts again,

The rocky spring, the greenwood glade;
To guide my lonely footsteps deign,
To prompt my slumbers in the murmuring shade,
And soothe my vacant ear with many an airy strain,

And thou, my faithful harp, no longer mourn
Thy drooping master's inauspicious hand:
Now brighter skies and fresher gales return,
Now fairer maids thy melody demand.
Daughters of Albion, listen to my lyre!
O Phoebus, guardian of the Aonian choir,
Why sounds not mine harmonious as thy own,
When all the virgin deities above

With Venus and with Juno move

In concert round the Olympian fathers' throne?

III.

Thee too, protectress of my lays,
Elate with whose majestic call
Above degenerate Latium's praise,
Above the slavish boast of Gaul,
I dare from impious thrones reclaim,
And wanton Sloth's ignoble charms,
The honours of a poet's name

To Somers' counsels, or to Hampden's arms, Thee, Freedom, I rejoin, and bless thy genuine flame.

Great citizen of Albion! thee
Heroic valour still attends,
And useful Science, pleas'd to see

How Art her studious toil extends,
While Truth, diffusing from on high
A lustre unconfin'd as day,

Fills and commands the public eye;
Till, pierc'd and sinking by her powerful ray,
Tame Faith and monkish Awe, like nightly de-
mons, fly.

Hence the whole land the patriot's ardour shares,
Hence dread Religion dwells with social Joy;
And holy passions and unsullied cares,

In youth, in age, domestic life employ.
O fair Britannia, hail!—With partial love
The tribes of men their native seats approve,
Unjust and hostile to each foreign fame :
But when for generous minds and manly laws
A nation holds her prime applause,
Their public zeal shall all reproof disclaim.

O, ye good powers! who look on human kind, Instruct the mighty moments as they roll; And watch the fleeting shapes in Curio's mind, And steer his passions steady to the goal. O Alfred, father of the English name, O valiant Edward, first in civil fame, O William, height of public virtue pure, Bend from your radiant seats a joyful eye, Behold the sum of all your labours nigh, Your plans of law complete, your ends of rule secure.

Twas then-Oshame! O soul from faith estrang'd! O Albion, oft to flattering vows a prey! 'Twas then-Thy thought what sudden frenzy chang'd?

What rushing palsy took thy strength away? Is this the man in Freedom's cause approv'd? The man so great, so honour'd, so belov'd? Whom the dead envy'd, and the living bless'd? This patient slave by tinsel bonds allur'd? This wretched suitor for a boon abjur'd? Whom those that fear'd him, scorn; that trusted him, detest?

O lost alike to action and repose!

With all that habit of familiar fame, Sold to the mockery of relentless foes,

And doom'd to exhaust the dregs of life in shame,

To act with burning brow and throbbing heart A poor deserter's dull exploded part,

To slight the favour thou canst hope no more, Renounce the giddy crowd, the vulgar wind, Charge thy own lightness on thy country's mind, And from her voice appeal to each tame foreign shore.

But England's sons, to purchase thence applause,
Shall ne'er the loyalty of slaves pretend,
By courtly passions try the public cause;

Nor to the forms of rule betray the end.
O race erect! by manliest passions mov'd,
The labours which to virtue stand approv'd,

Prompt with a lover's fondness to survey; Yet, where Injustice works her wilful claim, Fierce as the flight of Jove's destroying flame, Impatient to confront, and dreadful to repay.

These thy heart owns no longer. In their room See the grave queen of pageants, Honour, dwell, Couch'd in thy bosom's deep tempestuous gloom Like some grim idol in a sorcerer's cell. Before her rites thy sickening reason flew, Divine Persuasion from thy tongue withdrew, While Laughter mock'd, or Pity stole a sigh: Can Wit her tender movements rightly frame Where the prime function of the soul is lame? Can Fancy's feeble springs the force of Truth supply? But come: 'tis time: strong Destiny impends

To shut thee from the joys thou hast betray'd: With princes fill'd, the solemn fane ascends, By Infamy, the mindful demon sway'd. There vengeful vows for guardian laws effac'd, From nations fetter'd, and from towns laid waste, For ever through the spacious courts resound: There long posterity's united groan,

And the sad charge of horrours not their own, Assail the giant chiefs, and press them to the ground.

In sight old Time, imperious judge, awaits:
Above revenge, or fear, or pity, just,
He urgeth onward to those guilty gates

The great, the sage, the happy, and august. And still he asks them of the hidden plan

Whence every treaty, every war began, Evolves their secrets, and their guilt proclaims: And still his bands despoil them on the road Of each vain wreath by lying bards bestow'd, And crush their trophies huge, and rașe their sculptur'd names,

Ye mighty shades, arise, give place, attend:

Here his eternal mansion Curio seeks: [bend, -Low doth proud Wentworth to the stranger And his dire welcome hardy Clifford speaks: "He comes, whom late with surer arts prepar'd To accomplish all which we but vainly dar'd: Whom o'er the stubborn herd she taught to reign: Who sooth'd with gaudy dreams their raging Even to its last irrevocable hour; [power, Then baffled their rude strength, and broke them to the chain."

But ye, whom yet wise Liberty inspires,

Whom for her champions o'er the world she claims,

(That household godhead, whom of old your sires Sought in the woods of Elbe, and bore to Drive ye this hostile omen far away; [Thames) Their own fell efforts on her foes repay; Your wealth, your arts, your fame, be her's alone: Still gird your swords to combat on her side;

Still frame your laws her generous test to abide; And win to her defence the altar and the throne.

Protect her from yourselves, ere yet the flood
Of golden luxury, which Commerce pours,
Hath spread that selfish fierceness through your
blood,

Which not her lightest discipline endures: Snatch from fantastic demagogues her cause: Dream not of Numa's manners, Plato's laws: