And wishing for a place of rest Any thing rather than a chest. Then stepp'd the poet into bed
With this reflection in his head.
Beware of too sublime a sense Of your own worth and consequence ; The man who dreams himself so great, And his importance of such weight, That all around, in all that's done, Must move and act for him alone, Will learn in school of tribulation The folly of his expectation.
THE JUDGMENT OF THE POETS.
Two nymphs, both nearly of an age, Of numerous charms possess'd, A warm dispute once chanced to wage, Whose temper was the best.
The worth of each had been complete Had both alike been mild:
But one, although her smile was sweet, Frown'd oftener than she smiled.
And in her humour, when she frown'd, Would raise her voice, and roar, And shake with fury to the ground The garland that she wore.
The other was of gentler cast, From all such frenzy clear, Her frowns were seldom known to last, And never proved severe.
To poets of renown in song
The nymphs referr'd the cause, Who, strange to tell, all judged it wrong, And gave misplaced applause.
They gentle call'd, and kind and soft, The flippant and the scold,
And though she changed her mood so soft, That failing left untold.
No judges, sure, were e'er so mad, Or so resolved to err-
In short, the charms her sister had They lavish'd all on her.
Then thus the God whom fondly they Their great inspirer call,
Was heard, one genial summer's day, To reprimand them all.
"Since thus ye have combined," he said, "My favourite nymph to slight,
Adorning May, that peevish maid,
With June's undoubted right,
"The minx shall, for your folly's sake, Still prove herself a shrew,
Shall make your scribbling fingers ache, And pinch your noses blue."
SURVIVOR Sole, and hardly such, of all That once lived here, thy brethren, at my birth (Since which I number threescore winters past), A shatter'd veteran, hollow-trunk'd perhaps, As now, and with excoriate forks deform, Relics of ages! could a mind, imbued With truth from heaven, created thing adore, I might with reverence kneel, and worship thee. It seems idolatry with some excuse, When our forefather druids in their oaks Imagined sanctity. The conscience, yet Unpurified by an authentic act
Of amnesty, the meed of blood divine, Loved not the light, but, gloomy, into gloom Of thickest shades, like Adam after taste Of fruit proscribed, as to a refuge, fled.
Thou wast a bauble once, a cup and ball
Which babes might play with; and the thievish jay,
Seeking her food, with ease might have purloin'd The auburn nut that held thee, swallowing down
Thy yet close folded latitude of boughs And all thine embryo vastness at a gulp. But fate thy growth decreed; autumnal rains Beneath thy parent tree mellow'd the soil Design'd thy cradle; and a skipping deer, With pointed hoof dibbling the glebe, prepared The soft receptacle, in which, secure, Thy rudiments should sleep the winter through. So fancy dreams. Disprove it, if ye can, Ye reasoners broad awake, whose busy search Of argument, employ'd too oft amiss, Sifts half the pleasures of short life away!
Thou fell'st mature; and, in the loamy clod Swelling with vegetative force instinct, Didst burst thine egg, as theirs the fabled twins, Now stars; two lobes, protruding, pair'd exact ; A leaf succeeded, and another leaf,
And, all the elements thy puny growth
Fostering propitious, thou becamest a twig. Who lived when thou wast such? Oh, couldst thou speak,
As in Dodona once thy kindred trees Oracular, I would not curious ask
The future, best unknown, but, at thy mouth Inquisitive, the less ambiguous past.
By thee I might correct, erroneous oft, The clock of history, facts and events Timing more punctual, unrecorded facts Recovering, and misstated setting right Desperate attempt, till trees shall speak again. 20
Time made thee what thou wast, king of the
And time hath made thee what thou art—a cave For owls to roost in. Once thy spreading boughs O'erhung the champaign; and the numerous flocks That grazed it stood beneath that ample cope Uncrowded, yet safe shelter'd from the storm. No flock frequents thee now. Thou hast outlived Thy popularity, and art become
(Unless verse rescue thee awhile) a thing Forgotten, as the foliage of thy youth.
While thus through all the stages thou hast Of treeship-first a seedling, hid in grass; Then twig; then sapling; and, as century roll'd Slow after century, a giant bulk
Of girth enormous, with moss-cushion'd root Upheaved above the soil, and sides emboss'd With prominent wens globose; till at the last The rottenness, which time is charged to inflict On other mighty ones, found also thee— What exhibitions various hath the world Witness'd of mutability in all
That we account most durable below! Change is the diet on which all subsist, Created changeable, and change at last Destroys them. Skies uncertain now the heat Transmitting cloudless, and the solar beam Now quenching in a boundless sea of clouds- Calm and alternate storm, moisture, and drought, Invigorate by turns the springs of life
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