At last, extinct each focial feeling, fell
And joyless inhumanity pervades
And petrefies the heart. Nature disturb'd
Is deem'd, vindictive, to have chang'd her course.
HENCE, in old dusky time, a deluge came: When the deep-cleft difparting orb, that arch'd 310 The central waters round, impetuous rush'd, With univerfal burft, into the gulph, And o'er the high-pil'd hills of fractur'd earth Wide dash'd the waves, in undulation vaft; Till, from the center to the ftreaming clouds, A shoreless ocean tumbled round the globe.
THE Seafons fince have, with feverer fway, Opprefs'd a broken world: the Winter keen Shook forth his wafte of fnows; and Summer shot His peftilential heats. Great Spring, before, Green'd all the year; and fruits and bloffoms blush'd, In focial sweetness, on the felf- fame bough.
Pure was the temperate air; an even calm
Perpetual reign'd, fave what the zephyrs bland
Breath'd o'er the blue expanfe: for then nor ftorms
Were taught to blow, nor hurricanes to rage;
Sound slept the waters; no fulphureous glooms
Swell'd in the sky, and fent the lightning forth;
While fickly damps, and cold autumnal fogs,
Hung not, relaxing, on the fprings of life.
But now, of turbid elements the fport,
From clear to cloudy toft, from hot to cold,
And dry to moift, with inward-eating change,
Our drooping days are dwindled dowm to nought,
Their period finish'd ere 'tis well begun.
AND yet the wholesome herb neglected dies;
Tho' with the pure exhilarating foul
Of nutriment and health, and vital powers,
Beyond the fearch of art, 'tis copious bleft.
For, with hot ravine fir'd, enfanguin'd Man
Is now become the lion of the plain,
And worse. The wolf, who from the nightly fold
Fierce drags the bleating prey, ne'er drunk her milk,
Nor wore her warming fleece: nor has the fteer,
At whofe ftrong cheft the deadly tyger hangs,
E'er plow'd for him. They too are temper'd high,
With hunger ftung and wild neceflity,
Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast.
But Man, whom Nature form'd of milder clay,
With every kind emotion in his heart,
And taught alone to weep; while from her lap
She pours ten thoufand delicacies, herbs,
And fruits, as numerous as the drops of rain
Or beams that gave them birth: shall he, fair form!
Who wears sweet fmiles, and looks erect on Heaven, 355
E'er ftoop to mingle with the prowling herd,
And dip his tongue in gore? The beaft of prey,
Blood-ftain'd, deferves to bleed: but you, ye flocks,
What have you done; ye peaceful people, what,
To merit death? you, who have given us milk
In luscious ftreams, and lent us your own coat
Against the winter's cold? And the plain ox,
That harmless, honeft, guilelefs animal,
In what has he offended? he, whose toil,
Patient and ever ready, clothes the land
With all the pomp of harvest; shall he bleed, '
And ftruggling groan beneath the cruel hands
Even of the clown he feeds? and that, perhaps,
To fwell the riot of th' autumnal feaft,
Won by his labour? Thus the feeling heart
Would tenderly fuggeft: but 'tis enough,
In this late age, adventurous, to have touch'd
Light on the numbers of the Samian fage,
High HEAVEN forbids the bold prefumptuous ftrain,
Whose wifeft will has fix'd us in a ftate
That must not yet to pure perfection rife.
Befides, who knows, how rais'd to higher life,
From ftage to ftage, the vital Scale afcends?
Now when the first foul torrent of the brooks,
Swell'd with the vernal rains, is ebb'd away;
And, whitening, down their moffy-tinctur'd ftream
Defcends the billowy foam: now is the time,
While yet the dark-brown water aids the guile,
To tempt the trout. The well-diffembled fly
The rod fine-tapering with elastic spring,
Snatch'd from the hoary fteed the floating line,
And all thy slender watry ftores prepare.
But let not on thy hook the tortur'd worm,
Convulfive, twift in agonizing folds;
Which, by rapacious hunger fwallow'd deep,
Gives, as you tear it from the bleeding breast
Of the weak helplefs uncomplaining wretch,
Harsh pain and horror to the tender hand.
WHEN with his lively ray the potent fun Has pierc'd the ftreams, and rous'd the finny race, 395 Then, iffuing chearful, to thy sport repair; Chief should the western breezes curling play, And light o'er ether bear the shadowy clouds.
High to their fount, this day, amid the hills,
And woodlands warbling round, trace up the brooks; 400
The next, purfue their rocky channel'd maze,
Down to the river, in whose ample wave
Their little naiads love to fport at large.
Juft in the dubious point, where with the pool
Is mix'd the trembling ftream, or where it boils
Around the ftone, or from the hollow'd bank
Reverted plays in undulating flow,
There throw, nice-judging, the delufive fly;
And as you lead it round in artful curve,
With eye attentive mark the springing game.
Strait as above the furface of the flood
They wanton rife, or urg'd by hunger leap,
Then fix, with gentle twitch, the barbed hook:
Some lightly toffing to the graffy bank,
And to the shelving shore slow-dragging fome,
With various hand proportion'd to their force.
If yet too young, and easily deceiv'd,
A worthless prey fcarce bends your pliant rod,
Him, piteous of his youth and the short space
He has enjoy'd the vital light of Heaven,
Soft difengage, and back into the stream
The fpeckled captive throw. But should you lure
From his dark haunt, beneath the tangled roots
Of pendant trees, the monarch of the brook,
Behoves you then to ply your finest art.
Long time he, following cautious, fcans the fly;
And oft attempts to feize it, but as oft
The dimpled water fpeaks his jealous fear.
At laft, while haply o'er the shaded fun
Paffes a cloud, he defperate takes the death,
With fullen plunge. At once he darts along,
Deep-ftruck, and runs out all the lengthen'd line;
Then feeks the fartheft ooze, the sheltering weed,
The cavern'd bank, his old fecure abode;
And flies aloft, and flounces round the pool,
Indignant of the guile. With yielding hand,
That feels him ftill, yet to his furious courfe
Gives way, you, now retiring, following now
Acrofs the ftream, exhauft his idle rage:
Till floating broad upon his breathless fide,
And to his fate abandon'd, to the shore
Yon gayly drag your unrefifting prize.
THUS pass the temperate hours: but when the fun Shakes from his noon-day throne the fcattering clouds, Even shooting liftlefs languor thro' the deeps;. Then feek the bank where flowering elders croud, Where fcatter'd wild the lily of the vale Its balmy effence breathes, where cowslips hang
The dewy head, where purple violets lurk,
With all the lowly children of the shade:
Or lie reclin'd beneath yon fpreading ash,
Hung o'er the fteep; whence, borne on liquid wing,
The founding culver shoots; or where the hawk,
High, in the beetling cliff, his airy builds.
There let the claffic page thy fancy lead
Thro' rural fcenes; fuch as the Mantuan fwain
Paints in the matchlefs harmony of fong.
Or catch thy felf the landskip, gliding swift
Athwart imagination's vivid eye:
Or by the vocal woods and waters lull'd,
And loft in lonely mufing, in a dream,
Confus'd, of careless folitude, where mix
Ten thousand wandering images of things,
Soothe every guft of passion into peace;
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