With luxury, and death? What tho' his bowl
Flames not with coftly juice; nor funk in beds,
Oft of gay care, he toffes out the night,
Or melts the thoughtless hours in idle state?
What tho' he knows not those fantastic joys,
That still amuse the wanton, ftill deceive;
A face of pleasure, but a heart of pain;
Their hollow moments undelighted all?
Sure peace is his; a folid life, eftrang'd
To difappointment, and fallacious hope:
Rich in content, in Nature's bounty rich,
In herbs and fruits; whatever greens the Spring,
When heaven defcends in fhowers; or bends the bough
When Summer reddens, and when Autumn beams;
Qr in the wintry glebe whatever lies
Conceal'd, and fattens with the richest fap: 1175
These are not wanting; nor the milky drove,
Luxuriant, fpread o'er all the lowing vale;
Nor bleating mountains; nor the chide of streams, ]
And hum of bees, inviting fleep fincere
Into the guiltless breaft, beneath the shade,
Or thrown at large amid the fragrant hay ;
Nor ought befides of profpect, grove, or fong,
Dim grottoes, gleaming lakes, and fountain clear.
Here too dwells fimple truth; plain innocence;
Unfullied beauty; found unbroken youth,
Patient of labour, with a little pleas'd;
Health ever blooming; unambitious toil;
Calm contemplation, and poetic ease.
LET others brave the flood in queft of gain, 1189
And beat, for joyless months, the gloomy wave.
Let fuch as deem it glory to destroy
Rush into blood, the fack of cities seek ;
Unpierc'd, exulting in the widow's wail,
The virgin's fhriek, and infant's trembling cry.
Let fome, far-diftant from their native foil,
Urg'd or by want or hardened avarice,
Find other lands beneath another fun.
Let this through cities work his cager way,
By legal outrage and establish'd guile,
The focial fenfe extinct; and that ferment
Mad into tumult the feditious herd,
Or melt them down to flavery. Let these
Infnare the wretched in the toils of law,
Fomenting difcord, and perplexing right,
An iron race! and thofe of fairer front,
But equal inhumanity, in courts,
Delufive pomp, and dark cabals, delight;
Wreathe the deep bow, diffuse the lying smile,
And tread the weary labyrinth of ftate.
While he, from all the stormy paffions free
That reftlefs Men involve, hears, and but hears,
At diftance fafe, the human tempest roar,
Wrapt close in confcious peace. The fall of kings,.
The rage of nations, and the crush of ftates, 1214
Move not the Man, who, from the world escap'd,
In still retreats, and flowery folitudes,
To Nature's voice attends, from month to month,
And day to day, thro' the revolving year;
Admiring, fees her in her every shape;
Feels all her fweet emotions at his heart;
Takes what the liberal gives, nor thinks of more.
He, when young Spring protrudes the bursting gems>
Marks the first bud, and sucks the healthful gale
Into his freshened foul; her genial hours
He full enjoys; and not a beauty blows,
And not an opening blossom breathes in vain.
In Summer he, beneath the living shade,
Such as o'er frigid Tempe wont to wave,
Or Hemus cool, reads what the Muse, of these
Perhaps, has in immortal numbers fung;
Or what she dictates writes: and, oft an eye
Shot round, rejoices in the vigorous year.
When Autumn's yellow luftre gilds the world,
And tempts the fickled swain into the field,
Seiz'd by the general joy, his heart diftends
With gentle throws; and, thro' the tepid gleams
Deep mufing, then he beft exerts his fong.
Even Winter wild to him is full of blifs.
The mighty tempeft, and the hoary waste,
Abrupt, and deep, ftretch'd o'er the buried earth,
Awake to folemn thought. At night the skies,
Disclos'd, and kindled, by refining froft,
Pour every luftre on th' exalted eye.
A friend a book the stealing hours fecure,
1244 And mark them down for wisdom. With fwift wing, O'er land and fea imagination roams;
Or truth, divinely breaking on his mind,
Elates his being, and unfolds his powers;
Or in his breaft heroic virtue burns.
The touch of kindred too and love he feels;
The modeft eye, whose beams on his alone
Extatic shine; the little strong embrace
Of pratling 'children, twin'd around his neck,
And emulous to please him, calling forth
The fond parental foul. Nor purpose gay,
Amusement, dance, or fong, he fternly scorns;
For happiness and true philofophy
Are of the focial ftill, and fmiling kind.
This is the life which those who fret in guilt,
And guilty cities, never knew; the life,
Led by primeval ages, uncorrupt,
When angels dwelt, and GoD himself, with Man!
OH NATURE! all-fufficient! over all!
Inrich me with the knowledge of thy works! 1264
Snatch me to heaven; thy rolling wonders there,
World beyond world, in infinite extent,
Profufely scattered o'er the blue immense,
Shew me their motions, periods, and their laws,
Give me to fcan; thro' the difclofing deep
Light my blind way the mineral Strata there;
Thruft, blooming, thence the vegetable world;
O'er that the rifing fyftem, more complex,
Of animals; and higher ftill, the mind,
The varied-scene of quick-compounded thought,
And where the mixing paffions endless shift;
These ever open to my ravish'd eye :
A search, the flight of time can ne'er exhaust!
But if to that unequal; if the blood,
In fluggish streams about my heart, forbid
That best ambition; under closing shades,
Inglorious, lay me by the lowly brook,
And whisper to my dreams. From THEE begin,
Dwell all on THEE, with THEE Conclude my fong; And let me never never stray from THEE!
|