By a cheap victim and uplifted hands.
Long had he wish'd to write, but was withheld,
And writes at laft, by love alone compell'd;
For fame, too often true, when she alarms,
Reports thy neighbouring fields a scene of arms;
Thy city against fierce befiegers barr'd,
And all the Saxon chiefs for fight prepared.
Enyo wastes thy country wide around,
And faturates with blood the tainted ground;
Mars refts contented in his Thrace no more,
But goads his steeds to fields of German gore,
The ever verdant olive fades and dies,
And Peace, the trumpet-hating goddess, flies,
Flies from that earth which justice long had left,
And leaves the world of its laft guard bereft.
"Thus horror girds thee round. Meantime alone Thou dwell'ft, and helpless, in a foil unknown; Poor, and receiving from a foreign hand The aid denied thee in thy native land. Oh, ruthless country, and unfeeling more Than thy own billow-beaten chalky shore! Leaveft thou to foreign care the worthies given By Providence to guide thy steps to heaven? His ministers, commiffion'd to proclaim Eternal bleffings in a Saviour's name! Ah then most worthy, with a foul unfed, In Stygian night to lie for ever dead! So once the venerable Tishbite stray'd An exiled fugitive from shade to fhade, When, flying Ahab and his fury wife, In lone Arabian wilds he fhelter'd life; So from Philippa wander'd forth forlorn
Cilician Paul, with founding fcourges torn;
And Chrift himself, fo left, and trod no more
The thankless Gergefene's forbidden shore.
"But thou take courage! ftrive against despair! Quake not with dread, nor nourish anxious care! Grim war indeed on every fide appears,
And thou art menaced by a thousand fpears;
Yet none shall drink thy blood, or shall offend
E'en the defenceless bofom of my friend.
For thee the Ægis of thy God shall hide,
Jehovah's self shall combat on thy fide.
The fame who vanquish'd under Sion's towers
At filent midnight all Affyria's powers,
The fame who overthrew in ages past
Damafcus' fons that laid Samaria waste!
Their king he fill'd and them with fatal fears
By mimic founds of clarions in their ears,
Of hoofs, and wheels, and neighings from afar,
Of clashing armour, and the din of war.
Thou, therefore (as the most afflicted may), Still hope, and triumph o'er thy evil day! Look forth, expecting happier times to come, And to enjoy, once more, thy native home!"
ON THE APPROACH OF SPRING.
Written in the Author's 20th Year.
IME, never wandering from his annual
round,
Bids Zephyr breathe the spring, and
thaw the ground;
Bleak winter flies, new verdure clothes the plain,
And earth affumes her tranfient youth again.
Dream I, or alfo to the fpring belong
Increase of genius, and new powers of fong?
Spring gives them, and, how strange foe'er it seems,
Impels me now to fome harmonious themes.
Caftalia's fountain, and the forked hill
By day, by night, my raptured fancy fill;
My bofom burns and heaves, I hear within
A facred found that prompts me to begin.
Lo! Phœbus comes, with his bright hair he blends
The radiant laurel wreath; Phœbus descends!
I mount, and undeprefs'd by cumbrous clay,
Through cloudy regions win my easy way;
Rapt through poetic shadowy haunts I fly :
The fhrines all open to my dauntless eye,
My spirit fearches all the realms of light,
And no Tartarean gulfs elude my fight.
But this ecftatic trance-this glorious ftorm
Of infpiration-what will it perform?
Spring claims the verfe that with his influence
glows,
And shall be paid with what himself bestows. Thou, veil'd with opening foliage, lead'st the throng
Of feather'd minstrels, Philomel! in fong;
Let us, in concert, to the season fing,
Civic and sylvan heralds of the Spring!
With notes triumphant Spring's approach declare!
To Spring, ye Mufes, annual tribute bear!
The Orient left, and Ethiopia's plains,
The Sun now northward turns his golden reins;
Night creeps not now; yet rules with gentle fway,
And drives her dusky horrors swift away;
Now lefs fatigued, on this ethereal plain
Boötes follows his celeftial wain;
And now the radiant fentinels above,
Lefs numerous, watch around the courts of Jove,
For, with the night, force, ambush, flaughter fly,
And no gigantic guilt alarms the sky.
Now, haply says some shepherd, while he views,
Recumbent on a rock, the reddening dews,
This night, this, furely, Phœbus mifs'd the fair,
Who stops his chariot by her amorous care.
Cynthia, delighted by the morning's glow,
Speeds to the woodland, and refumes her bow;
Refigns her beams, and, glad to disappear,
Bleffes his aid, who shortens her career.
Come-Phœbus cries-Aurora, come-too late
Thou lingereft, flumbering, with thy wither'd mate;
Leave him, and to Hymettus' top repair!
Thy darling Cephalus expects thee there.
The goddess with a blush her love betrays,
But mounts, and, driving rapidly, obeys.
Earth now defires thee, Phœbus! and, to engage Thy warm embrace, cafts off the guise of age; Defires thee, and deserves; for who so sweet When her rich bofom courts thy genial heat? Her breath imparts to every breeze that blows Arabia's harvest and the Paphian rose.
Her lofty front she diadems around
With facred pines, like Ops on Ida crown'd;
Her dewy locks, with various flowers new-blown,
She interweaves, various, and all her own;
For Proferpine, in such a wreath attired,
Tænarian Dis himself with love infpired.
Fear not, left, cold and coy, the nymph refuse!
Herself, with all her fighing Zephyrs, fues;
Each courts thee, fanning soft his fcented wing,
And all her groves with warbled wishes ring.
Nor, unendow'd and indigent, aspires
The amorous Earth to engage thy warm defires,
But, rich in balmy drugs, affifts thy claim,
Divine Phyfician! to that glorious name.
If fplendid recompense, if gifts can move
Defire in thee (gifts often purchase love),
She offers all the wealth her mountains hide,
And all that refts beneath the boundless tide.
How oft, when headlong from the heavenly steep
She fees thee playing in the western deep,
How oft fhe cries-" Ah Phœbus, why repair
Thy wafted force, why feek refreshment there?
Can Tethys win thee? wherefore shouldst thou lave
A face fo fair in her unpleasant wave?
Come, feek my green retreats, and rather choose
To cool thy treffes in my crystal dews.
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