Elegant as fimplicity, and warm As ecstasy, unmanacled by form, Not prompted, as in our degen'rate days, And yet magnificent-a God the theme! Man lavish'd all his thoughts on human things- 'Twas thus till luxury feduc'd the mind Then genius danc'd a bacchanal; he crown'd His brows with ivy, rush'd into the field The victim of his own lafcivious fires, And, dizzy with delight, profan'd the facred wires. Anacreon, Horace, play'd in Greece and Rome This Bedlam part; and others nearer home. When Cromwell fought for pow'r, and while he reign'd The proud protector of the pow'r he gain'd, Religion harth, intolerant, austere, Parent of manners like herself severe, Without the fmile, the sweetness, or the gre The dark and fullen humour of the time Verfe, in the finest mould of fancy cast, Was lumber in an age so void of taste : But, when the fecond Charles affum'd the sway, Then, like a bow long forc'd into a curve, The mind, releas'd from too constrain'd a nerve, That made the vaulted roofs of pleasure ring. His court, the diffolute and hateful school Of wantonnefs, where vice was taught by rule, Swarm'd with a fcribbling herd, as deep inlaid From these a long fucceffion, in the rage Nor ceas'd, 'till, ever anxious to redress In front of these came Addifon. In him Humour in holiday and fightly trim, To polish, furnish, and delight, the mind. In verse well disciplin'd, complete, compact, Gave virtue and morality a grace, That, quite eclipfing pleasure's painted face, Ev'n on the fools that trampled on their laws. So nice his ear, fo delicate his touch) And ev'ry warbler has his tune by heart. Her serious mirth, to Arbuthnot and Swift, With droll fobriety they rais'd a fmile At folly's coft, themselves unmov'd the while. That conftellation fet, the world in vain Muft hope to look upon their like again. { A. Are we then left-B. Not wholly in the dark; Wit now and then, ftruck fmartly, fhows a spark, Sufficient to redeem the modern race From total night and abfolute difgrace. While fervile trick and imitative knack Confine the million in the beaten track, Perhaps fome courfer, who difdains the road, Snuffs up the wind, and flings himself abroad. Contemporaries all surpass'd, see one; Short his career, indeed, but ably run; And, like a scatter'd seed at random sown, Too proud for art, and trusting in mere force, He ftruck the lyre in fuch a careless mood, And fo difdain'd the rules he understood, |