Oh, flave! with pow'rs thou didst not dare exert, Verse cannot stoop fo low as thy defert; It shakes the fides of fplenetic difdain, Thou felf-entitled ruler of the main, To trace thee to the date when yon fair fea, That clips thy fhores, had no fuch charms for thee; When other nations flew from coast to coast, And thou hadst neither fleet nor flag to boast. Kneel now, and lay thy forehead in the duft; Blush, if thou canft; not petrified, thou must; Act but an honeft and a faithful part; Compare what then thou waft with what thou art; And, God's difpofing providence confefs'd, Obduracy itself must yield the reft. Then thou art bound to serve him, and to prove, Hour after hour, thy gratitude and love. Has he not hid thee, and thy favour'd land, For ages fafe beneath his shelt'ring hand, Giv'n thee his bleffing on the clearest proof, Bid nations leagu'd against thee ftand aloof, And charg'd hoftility and hate to roar Where else they would, but not upon thy fhore? Her gloomy monarch, doubtful and refign'd Then too much fear'd, and now too much forgot, And hop'd to feize his abdicated helm, 'Twas but to prove how quickly, with a frown, Thy foes implacable, thy land at reft; While his own heav'n furveys the troubled scene, Thou haft as bright an int'reft in her rays And all from fhore to fhore is free befide. Such freedom is-and Windfor's hoary tow'rs Th' unfading laurel and the virgin too *! Now think, if pleasure have a thought to fpare; If God himself be not beneath her care; Alluding to the grant of Magna Charta, which was extorted from king John by the Barons at Runnymede near Windfor. If bus'nefs, constant as the wheels of time, How much, though long neglected, shining yet, And Bonner, blithe as shepherd at a wake, Receiv'd the feal of martyrdom in blood, In fuch a cause they could not dare to fear; They could not purchase earth with such a prize, Or fpare a life too fhort to reach the skies, From them to thee convey'd along the tide, Their ftreaming hearts pour'd freely when they died; Those truths, which neither use nor years impair, Invite thee, woo thee, to the blifs they share. What dotage will not vanity maintain? What web too weak to catch a modern brain? On special search, the keen-ey'd eagle blind. Wisdom and goodness are twin-born, one heart And this delightful earth, and that fair sky, And He, whofe pow'r mere nullity obeys, Who found thee nothing, form'd thee for his praise. |