Perhaps even now, some cold fastidious judge
Casts a disdainful eye; and calls my toil,
And calls the love and beauty which I sing,
The dream of folly. Thou, grave censor! say,

Is Beauty then a dream, because the glooms
Of dullness hang too heavy on thy sense
To let her shine upon thee? So the man

Whose eye ne'er open'd on the light of Heaven,
Might smile with scorn while raptured vision tells
Of the gay-colour'd radiance flushing bright
O'er all creation. From the wise be far

Such gross unhallow'd pride; nor needs my song
Descend so low; but rather now unfold,
If human thought could reach, or words unfold,
By what mysterious fabric of the mind,

The deep-felt joys and harmony of sound
Result from airy motion; and from shape
The lovely phantoms of sublime and fair.
By what fine ties hath God connected things
When present in the mind, which in themselves
Have no connexion? Sure the rising Sun
O'er the cerulean convex of the sea,

With equal brightness and with equal warmth
Might roll his fiery orb; nor yet the soul
Thus feel her frame expanded, and her powers
Exulting in the splendour she beholds;

Like a young conqueror moving through the pomp
Of some triumphal day. When join'd at eve,
Soft murmuring streams and gales of gentlest breath

Melodious Philomela's wakeful strain
Attemper, could not man's discerning ear
Through all its tones the sympathy pursue;
Nor yet this breath divine of nameless joy
Steal through his veins, and fan the awaken'd heart,
Mild as the breeze, yet rapturous as the song?

But were not Nature still endow'd at large With all which life requires, though unadorn'd With such enchantment: wherefore then her form So exquisitely fair? her breath perfumed

With such ethereal sweetness? whence her voice
Inform'd at will to raise or to repress

The impassion'd soul? and whence the robes of light
Which thus invest her with more lovely pomp
Than fancy can describe? Whence but from thee,
O source divine of ever-flowing love,

And thy unmeasured goodness? Not content
With every food of life to nourish man,
By kind illusions of the wondering sense
Thou makest all nature beauty to his eye,
Or music to his ear: well-pleased he scans
The goodly prospect; and with inward smiles
Treads the gay verdure of the painted plain;
Beholds the azure canopy of Heaven,
And living lamps that over-arch his head
With more than regal splendour; bends his ears
To the full choir of water, air, and earth;
Nor heeds the pleasing error of his thought,

Nor doubts the painted green or azure arch,
Nor questions more the music's mingling sounds
Than space, or motion, or eternal time;

So sweet he feels their influence to attract
The fixed soul; to brighten the dull glooms
Of care, and make the destined road of life
Delightful to his feet. So fables tell,
The adventurous hero, bound on hard exploits,
Beholds with glad surprise, by secret spells
Of some kind sage, the patron of his toils,
A visionary paradise disclosed

Amid the dubious wild: with streams, and shades, And airy songs, the enchanted landscape smiles, Cheers his long labours, and renews his frame.

What then is taste, but these internal powers Active, and strong, and feelingly alive To each fine impulse? a discerning sense Of decent and sublime, with quick disgust From things deform'd, or disarranged, or gross In species? This, nor gems, nor stores of gold, Nor purple state, nor culture can bestow; But God alone when first his active hand Imprints the secret bias of the soul. He, mighty parent! wise and just in all, Free as the vital breeze or light of heaven, Reveals the charms of Nature. Ask the swai:: Who journeys homeward from a summer day's Long labour, why, forgetful of his toils

And due repose, he loiters to behold

The sunshine gleaming as through amber clouas,
O'er all the western sky; full soon, I ween,
His rude expression and untutor❜d airs,
Beyond the power of language, will unfold
The form of beauty smiling at his heart,
How lovely! how commanding! But though Heaven
In every breast hath sown these early seeds
Of love and admiration, yet in vain,
Without fair Culture's kind parental aid,
Without enlivening suns, and genial showers,
And shelter from the blast, in vain we hope
The tender plant should rear its blooming head,
Or yield the harvest promised in its spring.
Nor yet will every soil with equal stores
Repay the tiller's labour; or attend
His will, obsequious, whether to produce
The olive or the laurel. Different minds
Incline to different objects: one pursues
The vast alone, the wonderful, the wild;
Another sighs for harmony and grace,

And gentlest beauty. Hence when lightning fires
The arch of Heaven, and thunders rock the ground.
When furious whirlwinds rend the howling air.

And Ocean, groaning from his lowest bed,
Heaves his tempestuous billows to the sky;
Amid the mighty uproar, while below

The nations tremble, SHAKSPEARE looks abroad
From some high cliff, superior, and enjoys

The elemental war. But WALLER longs,
All on the margin of some flowery stream,
To spread his careless limbs amid the cool
Of plantain shades, and to the listening deer
The tale of slighted vows and love's disdain
Resound soft-warbling all the livelong day :
Consenting Zephyr sighs; the weeping rill
Joins in his plaint, melodious;

mute the groves; And hill and dale with all their echoes mourn. Such and so various are the tastes of men.

Oh! blest of Heaven, whom not the languid songs Of Luxury, the syren! not the bribes

Of sordid Wealth, nor all the gaudy spoils
Of pageant HOMER, can seduce to leave

Those ever-blooming sweets, which from the store
Of Nature fair Imagination culls

To charm the enliven'd soul! What though not all
Of mortal offspring can attain the heights
Of envied life; though only few possess
Patrician treasures or imperial state;
Yet Nature's care, to all her children just,
With richer treasures and an ampler state,
Endows at large whatever happy man
Will deign to use them. His the city's pomp,
The rural honours his. Whate'er adorns

The princely dome, the column and the arch,
The breathing marbles and the sculptured gold,
Beyond the proud possessor's narrow claim,