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Thus genius rofe and fet at ordered times,
And shot a day-fpring into diftant climes,
Ennobling every region that he chofe;
He funk in Greece, in Italy he rofe:

And, tedious years of Gothic darkness paffed,
Emerged all fplendour in our ifle at laft.
Thus lovely halycons dive into the main,
Then fhow far off their fhining plumes again.
A. Is genius only found in epic lays?
Prove this, and forfeit all pretence to praise.
Make their heroic powers your own at once,
Or candidly confess yourself a dunce.

B. These were the chief: each interval of night
Was graced with many an undulating light.
In lefs illuftrious bards his beauty fhone
A meteor, or a ftar; in thefe the fun.

The nightingale may claim the topmoft bough, While the poor grafshopper must chirp below. Like him unnoticed, I, and fuch as I, Spread little wings, and rather skip than fly; Perched on the meagre produce of the land, An ell or two of profpect we command; But never peep beyond the thorny bound, Or oaken fence, that hems the paddock round. In Eden, ere yet innocence of heart

Had faded, poetry was not an art;

Language, above all teaching, or, if taught,
Only by gratitude and glowing thought,
Elegant as fimplicity, and warm
As ecftafy, unmanacled by form,

Not prompted, as in our degen'rate days,
By low ambition and the thirst of praise,
Was natural as is the flowing stream,
And yet magnificent-A God the theme!
That theme on earth exhaufted, though above
'Tis found as everlafting as his love,

Man lavish'd all his thoughts on human things—
The feats of heroes, and the wrath of kings:
But ftill, while virtue kindled his delight,
The fong was moral, and fo far was right.
'Twas thus till luxury feduced the mind
To joys lefs innocent, as lefs refin'd;
Then genius danc'd a bacchanal; he crown'd
The brimming goblet, feiz'd the thyrfus, bound
His brows with ivy, rush'd into the field
Of wild imagination, and there reel'd,

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 harfh, intolerant, auftere,

Parent of manners like herself fevere,

Drew a rough copy of the Chriftian face
Without the fmile, the sweetness, or the grace;
The dark and fullen humour of the time
Judged every effort of the mufe a crime;
Verfe, in the fineft mould of fancy caft,

Was lumber in an age fo void of taste :
But when the fecond Charles affumed the fway,
And arts revived beneath a fofter day,
Then, like a bow long forced into a curve,

The mind, released from too conftrained a nerve,
Flew to its firft pofition with a spring,

That made the vaulted roofs of pleasure ring.
His court, the diffolute and hateful school

Of wantonnefs, where vice was taught by rule,
Swarmed with a scribbling herd, as deep inlaid
With brutal luft as ever Circe made.

From thefe a long fucceffion, in the rage
Of rank obfcenity, debauched their age;
Nor ceased, till, ever anxious to redrefs
The abufes of her facred charge, the prefs,
The mufe inftructed a well-nurtured train
Of abler votaries to cleanse the stain,
And claim the palm for purity of song,
That lewdness had ufurped and worn fo long.
C

VOL. I.

Then decent pleafantry and fterling fenfe,

That neither gave nor would endure offence,
Whipped out of fight, with fatire juft and keen,

The puppy pack that had defiled the scene.

In him

In front of these came Addifon.
Humour in holiday and fightly trim,
Sublimity and attic tafte, combined,
To polish, furnish, and delight, the mind.
Then Pope, as harmony itself exact,
In verfe well difciplined, complete, compact,
Gave virtue and morality a grace,

That, quite eclipfing pleasure's painted face,
Levied a tax of wonder and applause,

Even on the fools that trampled on their laws.
But he (his mufical fineffe was fuch,

So nice his ear, fo delicate his touch)
Made poetry a mere mechanic art;

And every warbler has his tune by heart.
Nature imparting her fatiric gift,

Her ferious mirth, to Arbuthnot and Swift,
With droll fobriety they raised a smile

At folly's coft, themselves unmoved 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 fpark,

Sufficient to redeem the modern race
From total night and abfolute disgrace.
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 furpaffed, fee one;
Short his career, indeed, but ably run;
Churchill; himself unconscious of his powers,
In penury confumed his idle hours;

And, like a scattered feed at random fown,
Was left to fpring by vigour of his own.
Lifted at length, by dignity of thought
And dint of genius, to an affluent lot,
He laid his head in luxury's foft lap,
And took, too often, there his eafy nap.
If brighter beams than all he threw not forth,
'Twas negligence in him, not want of worth.
Surly and flovenly, and bold and coarie,
Too proud for art, and trufsting in mere force,
Spendthrift alike of money and of wit,
Always at speed, and never drawing bit,
He ftruck the lyre in fuch a careless mood,
And fo difdained the rules he understood,
The laurel feemed to wait on his command,
He fnatched it rudely from the muses' hand.

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