MORALITY, A FAMILIAR EPISTLE. THOUGH long at school and college dozing, Though long with those divines at school, Tell us, for Heaven or money's sake, I find the doctors and the sages "Tis like the rainbow's shifting zone, The doctors of the Porch advise, "Reason alone must claim direction, Though heaven the breeze, the breath supplied, Such was the rigid Zeno's plan 1 The gentleman to whom this poem is addressed is the author of some esteemed works, and was Mr. Moore's most particular friend. Mr. Moore has been very frequently heard to speak of him as one in whom "the elements were so mixed," that neither in his head nor heart had nature left any deficiency.-ED Now listen to the wily strains, When Pleasure, nymph with loosen'd zone, "Pleasure 's the only noble end Is this morality?—Oh, no! But thus it is, all sects we see Have watch-words of morality! Some cry out Venus, others Jove; Here 'tis religion, there 'tis love! But while they thus so widely wander, While mystics dream, and doctors ponder; And some, in dialectics firm, Seek virtue in a middle term; While thus they strive, in Heaven's defiance, The plain good man, whose actions teach › Aristippus, Oh! when I've seen the morning beam When Heaven and Nature claim the heart; ΤΟ THE NATAL GENIUS, A DREAM. THE MORNING OF HER BIRTH-DAY. IN witching slumbers of the night, That on thy natal moment smiled; Which was to bloom through all thy years; Nor yet did I forget to bind Love's roses, with his myrtle twined, How blest around thy steps I'd play ! Thy life should softly steal along, But all be sunshine, peace, and love! The wing of time should never brush To bid its roses withering die; L EPISTLES, ODES, ETC. PREFACE. THE principal poems in the following collection were written during an absence of fourteen months from Europe. Though curiosity was certainly not the motive of my voyage to America, yet it happened that the gratification of curiosity was the only advantage which I derived from it. Finding myself in the country of a new people, whose infancy had promised so much, and whose progress to maturity has been an object of such interesting speculation, I determined to employ the short period of time, which my plan of return to Europe afforded me, in travelling through a few of the States, and acquiring some knowledge of the inhabitants. The impression which my mind received from the character and manners of these republicans, suggested the Epistles which are written from the City of Washington and Lake Erie. How far I was right, in thus assuming the tone of a satirist against a people whom I viewed but as a stranger and a visitor, is a doubt which my feelings did not allow me time to investigate. All I presume to answer for is, the fidelity of the picture which I have given; and though prudence might have dictated gentler language, truth, I think, would have justified severer. I went to America, with prepossessions by no means unfavourable, and indeed rather indulged in many of those illusive ideas, with respect to the purity of the Government and the primitive happiness of the people, which I had early imbibed in my native country, where, unfortunately, discontent at home enhances every distant temptation, and the western world has long been looked to as a retreat from real or imaginary oppression; as the Elysian Atlantis, where persecuted patriots might find their visions realized, and be welcomed by kindred spirits to liberty and repose. I was completely disappointed in every flattering expecta |