IL PENSEROSO: Or the gloomy Pleasures of Melancholy.

Hence vain deluding joys,

The brood of Folly without father bred,
How little you bested,

Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys!

Dwell in some idle brain,

And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess, As thick and numberless

As the gay motes that people the sun-beams,

Or likeft hovering dreams,

The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train.
But hail! thou goddess, sage and holy,
Hail! divinest Melancholy,
Whose saintly visage is too bright
To hit the sense of human fight,
And therefore to our weaker view
O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue;
Black, but such as in esteem

Prince Memnon's sister might be seen,
Or that starr'd Ethiop queen that strove
To set her beauties praise above
The Sea-nymphs, and their pow'rs offended :
Yet thou art higher far defcended;
Thee bright-hair'd Vesta long of yore
To folitary Saturn bore ;

His daughter she (in Saturn's reign
Such mixture was not held a stain)
Oft in glimmering bow'rs and glades
He met her, and in secret shades
Of woody Ida's inmost grove,
While yet there was no fear of fove.
Come pensive nun, devout and pure,
Sober, stedfaft, and demure,
All in robe of darkest grain,
Flowing with majestic train,
And fable stole of Cyprus lawn,
O'er thy decent shoulders drawn.
Come, but keep thy wonted ftate,
With even step, and musing gate,
And looks commercing with the skies,
Thy rapt foul fitting in thine eyes:

There held in holy passion still
Forget thyself to marble, till
With a fad leaden downward cast
Thou fix them on the earth as faft :

And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet,
Spare Fast, that oft with Gods doth diet,
And hears the muses in a ring
Ay round about Jove's altar sing:
And add to these retired Leifure,
That in trim gardens takes his pleasure;
But first, and chiefeft, with thee bring,
Him that yon foars on golden wing,
Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne,
The cherub Contemplation;
And the mute Silence hist along,
'Less Philomel will deign a fong,
In her sweetest, saddest plight,
Smoothing the rugged brow of Night,
While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke,
Gently o'er th' accustom'd oak.
Sweet bird that shunn'st the noise of folly,
Most musical, most melancholy!
Thee chauntress oft the woods among
I woo to hear thy even-fong;
And missing thee, I walk unseen
On the dry smooth-fhaven green,
To behold the wand'ring moon,
Riding near her highest noon,
Like one that had been led aftray
Through the heav'n's wide pathless way,
And oft, as if her head the bow'd,
Stooping through a fleecy cloud.
Oft on a plat of rifing ground,
I hear the far off curfeu found,
Over some wide-water'd shore,
Swinging flow with fullen roar;
Or if the air will not permit,
Some still removed place will fit,
Where glowing embers through the room
Teach light to counterfeit a gloom,
Far from all refort of mirth,
Save the cricket on the hearth

Or the belman's drousy charm,
To bless the doors from nightly harm :
Or let my lamp at midnight hour
Be seen in some high lonely tow'r,
Where I may oft out-watch the Bear,
With thrice-great Hermes, or unsphere
The spirit of Plato to unfold

What worlds, or what vast regions hold
The immortal mind that hath forsook
Her mansion in this fleshy nook :
And of those Demons that are found
In fire, air, flood, or under ground,
Whose power hath a true consent
With planet, or with element.
Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy
In scepter'd pall come sweeping by,
Presenting I hebes, or Pelops' line,
Or the tale of Troy divine,
Or what (though rare) of later age
Ennobled hath the buskin'd stage.
But, O fad virgin, that thy power
Might raise Museus from his bower,
Or bid the foul of Orpheus fing
Such notes as, warbled to the string,
Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek,
And made hell grant what love did seek;
Or call up him that left half told
The story of Cambuscan bold,
Of Camball, and of Algarfife,
And who had Canace to wife,
That own'd the virtuous ring and glass,
And of the wond'rous horse of brass
On which the Tartar king did ride;
And if ought else great bards beside
In sage and folemn tunes have sung,
Of turnies and of trophies hung,
Of forests, and inchantments drear,
Where more is meant than meets the ear,
Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career,
Till civil-fuited Morn appear,
Not trickt and flounc't as she was wont
With the Attic boy to hunt,

But kercheft in a comely cloud,

While rocking winds are piping loud,
Or usher'd with a shower still,
When the guft hath blown his fill,
Ending on the russling leaves
With minute drops from off the eaves.
And when the fun begins to fling
His flaring beams, me, goddess, bring
To arched walks of twilight groves,
And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves,
Of pine, or monumental oak,
Where the rude ax with heavy stroke
Was never heard the nymphs to daunt,
Or fright them from their hallow'd haunt;
There in close covert by some brook,
Where no profaner eye may look,
Hide me from day's garish eye,
While the bee with honied thigh,
That at her flow'ry work doth fing,
And the waters murmuring,
With such confort as they keep
Entice the dewy feather'd Sleep;
And let some strange mysterious dream
Wave at his wings in airy stream
Of lively portraiture display'd,
Softly on my eye-lids laid :
And, as I wake, sweet music breathe
Above, about, or underneath,
Sent by fome spirit to mortals good,
Or th' unseen genius of the wood.
But let my dew-feet never fail
To walk the studious cloysters pale,
And love the high-embowed roof,
With antique pillars massy proof,
And storied windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light :
There let the pealing organ blow,
To the full-voic'd choir below,
In service high, and anthems clear,
As may with sweetness through mine ear
Dissolve me into extafies,

And bring all heav'n before mine eyes.

And may at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage,
The hairy gown, and mossy cell,
Where I may fit and rightly spell
Of every ftar that heav'n doth shew,
And every herb that sips the dew;
Till old experience do attain
To something like prophetic strain.
These pleasures, Melancholy, give,
And I with thee will chuse to live.

These poems are to be admired, as well for their clofe, fignificant, and expressive descriptions, as for the frequent and beautiful use the poet has made of the figure called Prosopopæia; by which he has perfonified almost every object in his view, raised a great number of pleasing images, and introduced qualities and things inanimate as living and rational beings.

We cannot quit this subject without taking some notice of that excellent poem, left us by Mr. Thomson, intituled the Seasons; which, notwithstanding fome parts of it are didactic, may with propriety be inferted under this head. (

In this work, the author has given us a poetical, philosophical, and moral description of the four seasons, viz. Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter.

Under Spring, he has described the season as it usually affects the various parts of nature, afcending from the lower to the higher, and confidered the influence of the Spring on inanimate matter, on vegetables, on brute animals, and on man; after which he concludes with a dissuafive from the wild and irregular passion of love, and recommends that of a pure and happy kind. The whole is embellished with suitable digressions, and moral reflections; and wrought up with wonderful art. His Address to heaven in favour of the farmer, and what follows in praise of agriculture, is extremely beautiful..

Be gracious, HEAVEN! for now laborious man
Has done his part. Ye fostering breezes, blow
Ye soft'ning dews, ye tender showers, descend!
And temper all, thou world-reviving sun,
Into the perfect year! nor ye who live
In luxury and ease, in pomp and pride,