diverfions or bufinefs as will fill the mind, or remove it from the object of its concern.

Go, foft enthufiaft! quit the cypress groves, Nor to the ivulet's lonely moanings tune Your fad complaint. Go, feek the chearful haunts Of men, and mingle with the bustling croud; Lay fchemes for wealth, or power, or fame, the wifh Of nobler minds, and push them night and day. Or join the caravan in queft of scenes

New to your eyes, and shifting every hour.

He then inveighs againft drinking, the common refource in diforders of this kind, and obferves, that, tho' the intoxicating draught may relieve for a time; the pains will return with ten-fold rage. And this he illuftrates with a beautiful fimile.

But foon your heav'n is gone, a heavier gloom Shuts o'er your head: and, as the thund'ring stream, Swoln o'er its banks with fudden mountain rain, Sinks from its tumult to a filent brook;

So, when the frantic raptures in your breast
Subfide, you languifh into mortal man ;
You fleep, and waking find yourself undone.
For prodigal of life in one rafh night

You lavifh'd more than might fupport three days.

He then points out the mifchiefs that attend drunkennefs; fuch as lofing friends by unguarded words, or doing rafh deeds that are never to be forgotten (but which may haunt a man with horror to his grave) the lofs of money, health and decay of parts; and then pays a grateful filial tribute to the memory of his father; whofe advice on the conduct of life he thus recommends.

How to live happieft; how avoid the pains,
The difappointments, and difgufts of those
Who would in pleafure all their hours employ;
The precepts here of a divine old man
I could recite. Tho' old, he ftill retained
His manly fenfe, and energy of mind.

Virtuous and wife he was, but not severe;
He ftill remember'd that he once was young;
His eafy prefence check'd no decent joy.
Him e'en the diffolute admir'd; for he
A graceful loofenefs, when he pleas'd, put on,
And laughing could inftruct. Much had he read,
Much more had feen; he studied from the life,
And in th' original perus'd mankind.

In the parts that follow are contain'd fome leffons for the conduct of life, from which we fhall infert a few maxims.

Vers'd in the woes and vanities of life,
He pity'd man and much he pity'd those
Whom falfly-finiling fate has curs'd with means
To diffipate their days in queft of joy.

With respect to indolence and luxury we have this leffon, which concludes with a definition of virtue and fenfe, and their good effects.

Let nature reft: be bufy for yourself,
And for your friend; be bufy even in vain,
Rather than teize her fated appetites.
Who never fafts, no banquet e'er enjoys ;
Who never toils nor watches, never fleeps.
Let nature reft: and when the taste of joy
Grows keen, indulge; but fhun fatiety.
'Tis not for mortals always to be bleft.
But him the leaft the dull or painful hours
Of life opprefs, whom fober fense conducts,
And virtue, thro' this labyrinth we tread.
Virtue and fenfe I mean not to disjoin ;
Virtue and fenfe are one: and, truft me, he.
Who has not virtue, is not truly wife.
Virtue (for mere good nature is a fool)
Is fenfe and fpirit, with humanity;

'Tis fometimes angry, and its frown confounds;
'Tis even vindictive, but in vengeance just.
This is the folid pomp of profperous days;,
The peace and fhelter of adversity.

The gawdy glofs of fortune only ftrikes
The vulgar eye: the fuffrage of the wife,
The praise that's worth ambition, is attain'd
By fenfe alone, and dignity of mind.

But from this difgreffion (or episode) the poet naturally returns to his fubject.

Thus, in his graver vein, the friendly fage Sometimes declaim'd. Of right and wrong he taught Truths as refin'd as ever Athens heard

And (ftrange to tell !) he practis'd what he preach'd.
Skill'd in the paffions, how to check their sway
He knew, as far as reafon can controul
The lawless powers. But other cares are mine:
Form'd in the fchool of Paon, I relate
What paffions hurt the body, what improve:
Avoid them, or invite them, as you may.

Know then, whatever chearful and ferene
Supports the mind, fupports the body too.
Hence the most vital movement mortals feel.
Is hope; the balm and life-blood of the foul.
It pleases, and it lafts. Indulgent heaven
Sent down the kind delufion, thro' the paths
Of rugged life to lead us patient on;

And make our happiest state no tedious thing.

He then speaks of the good and bad effects of love, and with regard to confummation, he fays;

Is health your care, or luxury your aim,
Be temperate ftill; when nature bids, obey;
Her wild impatient fallies bear no curb :
But when the prurient habit of delight,
Or loose imagination, fpurs you on

To deeds above your ftrength, impute it not
To nature nature all compulfion hates.

The poet then proceeds to other paffions, and the defcription he has given us of anger and its dreadful effects, is very beautiful and very juft.

But there's a paffion, whofe tempeftuous sway
Tears up each virtue planted in the breaft,
And shakes to ruins proud philofophy.
For pale and trembling anger rafhes in,
With fault'ring fpeech, and eyes that wildly ftare;
Fierce as the tyger, madder than the feas,

Defperate, and arm'd with more than human ftrength.
How foon the calm, humane, and polish'd man
Forgets compunction, and ftarts up a fiend!
Who pines in love, or wastes with filent cares,
Envy, or ignominy, or tender grief,

Slowly defcends, and ling'ring, to the fhades;
But he whom anger flings, drops, if he dies,
At once, and rufhes apoplectic down;
Or a fierce fever hurries him away.

Such fates attend the rafh alarm of fear,
And fudden grief, and rage, and fudden joy.

But there are conftitutions to which thefe boisterous fits, these violent fallies of paffion, may be fometimes ferviceable.

For where the mind a torpid winter leads,
Wrapt in a body corpulent and cold,
And each clogg'd function lazily moves on;
A generous fally spurns th' incumbent load,
Unlocks the breast, and gives a cordial glow.

Those however whose blood is apt to boil, and who are eafily moved to wrath he wou'd have,

Keep lent for ever; and forfwear the bowl.

And then offers fomething to the confideration of those whose turbulent tempers move them to seek revenge.

While choler works, good friend, you may be wrong; Diftruft yourself, and fleep before you fight. 'Tis not too late to-morrow to be brave; If honour bids, to-morrow kill or die.

The poet then feeks a remedy for thefe evils, fets the contrary paffions in oppofition, fo that they may counter

act each other; and at laft recommends mufick as the moft effectual.

He then concludes the whole with an encomium on the power of poetry and of mufic united, which is enrich'd with allufions to ancient fables and hiftorical facts; materials that we have often recommended as proper ornaments for these fort of poems.

But he the mufe's laurel juftly shares,

A poet he, and touch'd with heaven's own fire;
Who, with bold rage or folemn pomp of founds,
Inflames, exalts, and ravishes the foul;

Now tender, plaintive, fweet almost to pain,
In love diffolves you; now in fprightly strains
Breathes a gay rapture thro' your thrilling breast;
Or melts the heart with airs divinely fad ;
Or wakes to horror the tremendous ftrings.
Such was the bard, whose heavenly strains of old
Appeas'd the fiend of melancholy Saul..

Such was, if old and heathen fame say true,

The man who bade the Theban domes afcend,
And tam'd the favage nations with his fong;
And fuch the Thracian, whofe harmonious lyre,
Tun'd to foft woe, made all the mountains weep;
Sooth'd even th' inexorable powers of hell,
And half-redeem'd his loft Eurydice.

Mufic exalts each joy, allays each grief,
Expels difeafes, foftens every pain,

Subdues the rage of poison, and the plague;
And hence the wife of ancient days ador'd
One power of phyfic, melody, and fong.

We have dwelt long enough, perhaps too long, on this fubject; but as thefe poems are of fuch ufe, that what is taught in this agreeable manner will remain for ever fix'd on the memory, it feem'd the more necessary to be very particular and explicit in the rules, and to give variety of examples. We have only to add to what has been already faid, that the great art in the conduct of thefe poems is fo to adorn and enliven the precepts that they may agreeably ftrike the imagination; and to deliver them in fuch an indirect manner, that, the form of