Yet neither these delights, nor aught beside, That appetite can ask, or wealth provide, Can save us always from a tedious day, Or shine the dulness of still life away; Divine communion, carefully enjoy'd, Or sought with energy, must fill the void. O sacred art, to which alone life owes It's happiest seasons, and a peaceful clase, Scorn'd in a world, indebted to that scorn For evils daily felt and hardly borne, Not knowing thee, we reap with bleeding hands Flow'rs of rank odour upon thorny lands, And, while Experience cautions us in vain, Grasp seeming happiness, and find it pain. Despondence, self-deserted in her grief, Lost by abandoning her own relief, Murmuring and ungrateful Discontent, That scorns afflictions mercifully meant, Those humours tart as wines upon the fret, Which idleness and weariness beget; These, and a thousand plagues, that haunt the breast, Fond of the phantom of an earthly rest, Divine communion chases, as the day Drives to their dens th' obedient beasts of prey. See Judah's promis'd king, bereft of all, Hear the sweet accents of his tuneful voice, No, not a moment, in his royal heart; The grain, or herb, or plant, that each demands; And share the joys your bounty may create; In colour these, and those delight the smell, Or lay the landscape on the snowy sheet These, these are arts pursu'd without a crime, Employs, shut out from more important views, A monitor's, though not a poet's praise, THE YEARLY DISTRESS, OR TITHING TIME AT STOCK, IN ESSEX. Verses addressed to a country clergyman complaining of the dis agreeableness of the day annually appointed for receiving the dues at the parsonage. COME, ponder well, for 'tis no jest, This priest he merry is and blithe But oh! it cuts him like a sithe, He then is full of fright and fears, For then the farmers come jog, jog, Along the miry road, Each heart as heavy as a log, To make their payments good. In sooth, the sorrow of such days When he that takes and he that pays Now all unwelcome at his gates The clumsy swains alight, And well he may, for well he knows So in they come-each makes his leg, And not to quit a score. "And how does miss and madam do, 66 The little boy and all?" "All tight and well. And how do you, "Good Mr. What-d'ye-call?" |