Alike the bondage and the licence suit, The brute made ruler and the man made brute! Those rebel fiends, that rack the world, were nurst! Thou, gently lull'd in dreams of classic thought, Which few can feel, and bless'd that few who can! SONG. THE wreath you wove, the wreath you wove Is fair-but oh! how fair, If Pity's hand had stolen from Love One leaf to mingle there! If every rose with gold were tied, One faded leaf where love had sigh'd The wreath you wove, the wreath you wove Its bloom is yours, but hopeless love Astronomy should leave the skies, And now, my gentle hints to clear, ANACREONTIC. I FILL'D to thee, to thee I drank, Thy image in this ample cup, To whom I quaff'd my nectar up. Behold how bright that purple lip Is blushing through the wave at me! Every roseat drop I sip Is just like kissing wine from thee! But, oh! I drink the more for this; For, ever when the draught I drain, Thy lip invites another kiss, And in the nectar flows again! So, here's to thee, my gentle dear! And may that eye for ever shine LYING. Che con le lor bujie pajon divini. I DO confess, in many a sigh, TO'S PICTURE. Go then, if she whose shade thou art Some pangs, to give thee back again! With which she made thy semblance mine, As bitter is the burning tear, With which I now the gift resign! As some exchange for taking thee, FRAGMENT OF A MYTHOLOGICAL HYMN TO LOVE.' BLEST infant of eternity! Before the day-star learn'd to move, Thou wert alone, oh Love! Nestling beneath the wings of ancient night Whose horrors seem'd to smile in shadowing thee! No form of beauty sooth'd thine eye, As through the dim expanse it wander'd wide; No kindred spirit caught thy sigh, As o'er the watery waste it lingering died. Unfelt the pulse, unknown the power, That latent in his heart was sleeping; Oh Sympathy! that lonely hour Saw Love himself thy absence weeping! But look what glory through the darkness beams! Celestial airs along the water glide: What spirit art thou, moving o'er the tide So lovely? Art thou but the child Of the young godhead's dreams, That mock his hope with fancies strange and wild? Of his desiring eyes, And all impregnate with his sighs, They spring to life in shape so fair and warm! "Tis she! Psyche, the first born spirit of the air! To thee, oh Love! she turns, The blooming god-the spirit fair- And their first kiss is great Creation's dawn! TO HIS SERENE HIGHNESS THE DUKE OF MONTPENSIER, ON HIS PORTRAIT OF THE LADY ADELAIDE F-RB-S. Donington Park, 1802. To catch the thought, by painting's spell, And o'er the magic tablet tell The silent story of the mind; 1 Love and Psyche are here considered as the active and passive principles of creation, and the universe is supposed to have received its first harmonizing impulse from the nuptial sympathy between these two powers. A marriage is generally the first step in cosmogony. Timæus held Form to be the father, and Matter the mother of the world; Elion and Berouth, I think, are Sanchoniatho's first spiritual lovers, and Manco capac and his wife introduced creation amongst the Peruvians. In short, Harlequin seems to have studied cosmogonies, when he said "tutto il mondo è fatto rome la nostra famiglia." O'er Nature's form to glance the eye, Her evening blushes, ere they fade! And these, oh Prince! are richly thine! On which her eye delights to rest; While o'er the lovely look serene, The smile of Peace, the bloom of youth, The cheek, that blushes to be seen, The that tells the bosom's truth; eye, While o'er each line, so brightly true, Her soul with fond attention roves, Blessing the hand, whose various hue Could imitate the form it loves; She feels the value of thy art, And owns it with a purer zeal, A rapture, nearer to her heart, Than critic taste can ever feel! THE PHILOSOPHER ARISTIPPUS' TO A LAMP WHICH WAS GIVEN HIM BY LAIS. Dulcis conscia lectuli lucerna. Martial, Lib. xiv. Epig. 39. "OH! love the Lamp (my mistress said) The faithful Lamp that, many a night, Beside thy Lais' lonely bed Has kept its little watch of light "Full often has it seen her weep, 1 It was not very difficult to become a philosophe amongst the ancients. A moderate store of learning, with a considerable portion of confidence, and wit enough to produce an occasional apophthegm, were all the necessary qualifications for the purpose. The principles of moral science were so very imperfectly understood, that the founder of a new sect, in forming his ethical code, might consult either fancy or temperament, and adapt it to his own passions and propensities; so that Mahomet, with a little more learning might have flourished as a philosopher in those days, and would have required but the polish of the schools to become the rival of Aristippus in morality. In the science of nature too, though they discovered some valuable truths, yet they seemed not to know they were truths, or at least were as well satisfied with errors; and Xenophanes, who asserted that the stars were igneous clouds, lighted up every night and extinguished again in the morning, was thought and styled a philosopher, as generally as he who anticipated Newton in developing the arrangement of the universe. For this opinion of Xenophanes, see Plutarch de Placit. Philosoph. lib. ii. cap. 13. It is impossible to read this treatise of Plutarch, without alternately admiring and smiling at the genius, the absurdities of the philosophers And, in a murmur, wish thee there, That kiss to feel, that thought to share! "Then love the Lamp-'twill often lead Yes-dearest Lamp! by every charm On which thy midnight beam has hung;' The neck reclin'd, the graceful arm Across the brow of ivory flung; The heaving bosom, partly hid, The sever'd lip's delicious sighs, By these, by all that bloom untold, My Lamp and I shall never part! And often, as she smiling said, In fancy's hour, thy gentle rays Shall guide my visionary tread Through poesy's enchanting maze! Thy flame shall light the page refin'd, Where still we catch the Chian's breath, Where still the bard, though cold in death, Has left his burning soul behind! Or, o'er thy humbler legend shine, Oh man of Ascra's dreary glades!? To whom the nightly-warbling Nine3 A wand of inspiration gave,* Pluck'd from the greenest tree that shades The crystal of Castalia's wave. "Tis thus my heart shall learn to know 1 The ancients had their lucerna cubiculariæ, or bedchamber lamps, which, as the Emperor Galienus said, "nil cras meminere; and with the same commendation of secrecy, Praxagora addresses her lamp, in Aristophanes, Exxλs. We may judge how fanciful they were, in the use and embellishment of their lamps, from the famous symbolic Lucerna which we find in the Romanum Museum, Mich. Ang. Causei, p. 127. 2 Hesiod, who tells us in melancholy terms of his father's flight to the wretched village of Ascra. Epy. xa Husp. v. 251. v. 10. 3 Εννυχίας στοιχον, περικαλλέα όσσαν ιείσαι.-Theog. 4 Kя μs σтрov sdov, Supvns spinas olov. Id. v. 30. 5 Ρειν τα όλα ποταμού δίκην, as expressed among the dogmas of Heraclitus the Ephesian, and with the same image by Seneca, in whom we find a beautiful diffusion of the though "Nemo est mane, qui fuit pridie. Corpora I'll tell thee, as I trim thy fire, One little hour resign'd to thee- The sage's immortality! Then far be all the wisdom hence, And all the lore, whose tame control Would wither joy with chill delays! Alas! the fertile fount of sense, At which the young, the panting soul Drinks life and love, too soon decays! Sweet Lamp! thou wert not form'd to shed Thy splendour on a lifeless pageWhate'er my blushing LAIS said Of thoughtful lore and studies sage 'Twas mockery all-her glance of joy Told me thy dearest, best employ !2 And, soon as night shall close the eye Of Heaven's young wanderer in the west, When seers are gazing on the sky, To find their future orbs of rest; Then shall I take my trembling way, Unseen, but to those worlds above, nostra rapiuntur fluminum more; quicquid vides currit cum tempore. Nihil ex his quæ videmus manet. Ego ipse, dum loquor mutari ipsa, mutatus sum," etc. i Aristippus considered motion as the principle of happiness, in which idea he differed from the Epicureans, who looked to a state of repose as the only true voluptuousness, and avoided even the too lively agitations of pleasure, as a violent and ungraceful derangement of the senses. 2 Maupertuis has been still more explicit than this phi losopher, in ranking the pleasures of sense above the sublimest pursuits of wisdom. Speaking of the infant man, in his production, he calls him, "une nouvelle créature, qui pourra comprendre les choses les plus sublimes, et ce qui est bien au-dessus, qui pourra goûter les mêmes plaisirs." See his Venus Physique. This appears to be one of the efforts at Fontenelle's gallantry of manner, for which the learned President is so well ridiculed in the Akakia of Voltaire. Maupertuis may be thought to have borrowed from the ancient Aristippus that indiscriminate theory of pleasures which he has set forth in his Essai de Philosophie Morale, and for which he was so very justly condemned. Aristippus, according to Laertius, held μη διαφέρειν τι ηδονην ηδονής, which irrational sentiment has been adopted by Maupertuis: "Tant qu'on ne considère que l'état présent, tous les plaisirs sont du même genre," ect. ect. And, led by thy mysterious ray, Glide to the pillow of my love. Calm be her sleep, the gentle dear! Nor let her dream of bliss so near, Till o'er her cheek she thrilling feel My sighs of fire in murmurs steal, And I shall lift the locks, that flow Unbraided o'er her lids of snow, And softly kiss those sealed eyes, And wake her into sweet surprise! Or if she dream, oh! let her dream Of those delights we both have known And felt so truly, that they seem Form'd to be felt by us alone! The murmur'd sounds so dear to love! In that one moment waits for me! TO MRS. BL-H-D. WRITTEN IN HER ALBJM. Έντο δε τι εστι το ποτόν ; πλάνη, εφη. Cebetis Tabula. THEY say that Love had once a book, "Twas Innocence, the maid divine, Or thought profane should enter there And sweetly did the pages fill With fond device and loving lore, And every leaf she turn'd was still More bright than that she turn'd before. Beneath the touch of Hope, how soft, But, oh! there was a blooming boy, Who often turn'd the pages o'er, And though so soft his voice and look, Yet Innocence, whene'er he came, Would tremble for her spotless book! For still she saw his playful fingers Fill'd with sweets and wanton toys; And well she knew the stain that lingers After sweets from wanton boys! And so it chanc'd, one luckless night O'er the dear book, so pure, so white, And sullied lines and marge and all! In vain he sought, with eager lip, The honey from the leaf to drink, For still the more the boy would sip, The deeper still the blot would sink! Oh! it would make you weep to see The traces of this honey flood Steal o'er a page where Modesty Had freshly drawn a rose's bud! And Fancy's emblems lost their glow, And Hope's sweet lines were all defac'd, And Love himself could scarcely know What Love himself had lately trac'd! At length the urchin Pleasure fled, (For how, alas! could pleasure stay?) And Love, while many a tear he shed, In blushes flung the book away! The index now alone remains, Of all the pages spoil'd by Pleasure, And though it bears some honey stains, Yet Memory counts the leaf a treasure! And oft, they say, she scans it o'er, I know not if this tale be true, But thus the simple facts are stated; And I refer their truth to you, Since Love and you are near related! EPISTLE VII. TO THOMAS HUME, ESQ. M. D. FROM THE CITY OF WASHINGTON. ΔΙΗΓΗΣΟΜΑΙ ΔΙΗΓΗΜΑΤΑ ΙΣΩΣ ΑΠΙΣΤΑ, ΚΟΙΝΩΝΑ ΩΝ ΠΕΠΟΝΘΑ ΟΥΚ ΕΧΩΝ. Xenophont. Ephes. Ephesiac. lib. v. 'Tis evening now; the heats and cares of day Where blest he woos some black Aspasia's grace, wits in America. 1 The "black Aspasia" of the present ********* of the United States, "inter Avernales haud ignotissima nymphas" has given rise to much pleasantry among the anti-democrat 2 "On the original location of the ground now allotted for the seat of the Federal City (says Mr. Weld,) the identical spot on which the capitol now stands was called Rome. This anecdote is related by many as a certain prognostic of the future magnificence of this city, which is to be, as it were, a second Rome."-Weld's Travels, Letter iv. 3 A little stream that runs through the city, which with intolerable affectation, they have styled the Tiber. It was originally called Goose-Creek. 4 "To be under the necessity of going through a deep wood for one or two miles, perhaps, in order to see a next door neighbour, and in the same city, is a curious, and I believe a novel circumstance."-Weld, Letter iv. The Federal City (if it must be called a city,) has not been much increased since Mr. Weld visited it. Most of the public buildings, which were then in some degree of forwardness, have been since utterly suspended. The Hotel is already a ruin; a great part of its roof has fallen in, and the rooms are left to be occupied gratuitously by the miserable Scotch and Irish emigrants. The President's House, a very noble structure, is by no means suited to the philosophical humility of its present possessor, who inhabits but a corner of the mansion himself, and abandons the rest to a state of uncleanly desolation, which those who are not philosophers cannot look at without regret. This grand edifice is encircled by a very rude pale, through which a common rustic stile introduces the visitors of the first man in America. With respect to all that is in the house, I shall imitate the prudent forbearance of Herodotus, and say, τ рит. The private buildings exhibit the same characteristic display of arrogant speculation and premature ruin, and the few ranges of houses which were begun some years ago,| have remained so long waste and unfinished, that they are now for the most part dilapidated. 5 The picture which Buffon and De Pauw have drawn of the American Indian, though very humiliating, is, as far as I can judge, much more correct than the flattering representations which Mr. Jefferson has given us. See the Notes on Virginia, where this gentleman endeavours to disprove in general, the opinion maintained so strongly by some philosophers, that nature (as Mr. Jefferson expresses it,) belittles her productions in the western world. M. de Pauw attributes the imperfection of animal life in America to the ravages of a very recent deluge, from whose effects upon its soil and atmosphere it has not yet sufficiently recovered. See his Recherches sur les Americains, Part i. tom. i. p. 102. Of weak barbarians, swarming o'er its breast, Each blast of anarchy and taint of crime But hush!-observe that little mount of pines, 1 On a small hill near the capitol, there is to be an eques trian statue of General Washington. 2 In the ferment which the French revolution excited among the democrats of America, and the licentious sympathy with which they shared in the wildest excesses of jacobinism, we may find one source of that vulgarity of vice, that hostility to all the graces of life, which distin |