While some, on earnest business bent,
Their murmuring labours ply

'Gainst graver hours, that bring constraint To sweeten liberty;

Some bold adventurers disdain

The limits of their little reign,

And unknown regions dare descry:
Still, as they run, they look behind,
They hear a voice in every wind,
And snatch a fearful joy.

Gay Hope is theirs, by Fancy fed,
Less pleasing when possess'd;
The tear forgot as soon as shed,
The sunshine of the breast:
Their buxom health, of rosy hue:
Wild wit, invention ever new,

And lively cheer, of vigour born;
The thoughtless day, the easy night,
The spirits pure, the slumbers light,
That fly th' approach of morn.

Alas, regardless of their doom,
The little victims play!
No sense have they of ills to come,
No care beyond to-day.

Yet see how all around them wait
The ministers of human fate,

And black Misfortune's baleful train. Ah, show them where in ambush stand To seize their prey, the murderous band! Ah, tell them they are men!

These shall the fury passions tear,
The vultures of the mind,
Disdainful Anger, pallid Fear,

And Shame that skulks behind;

Or pining Love shall waste their youth,
Or Jealousy, with rankling tooth,
VOL. I.-G G

That inly gnaws the secret heart: And Envy wan, and faded Care, Grim-visaged, comfortless Despair, And Sorrow's piercing dart.

Ambition this shall tempt to rise,
Then whirl the wretch from high,
To bitter Scorn a sacrifice,
And grinning Infamy;

The stings of Falsehood those shall try,
And hard Unkindness' alter'd eye,

That mocks the tear it forced to flow;
And keen Remorse, with blood defiled,
And moody Madness laughing wild
Amid severest wo.

Lo, in the vale of years beneath
A grisly troop are seen,

The painful family of Death,

More hideous than their queen:
This racks the joints, this fires the veins,
That every labouring sinew strains,
Those in the deeper vitals rage:

Lo, Poverty, to fill the band,
That numbs the soul with icy hand,
And slow-consuming Age.

To each his sufferings: all are men,
Condemn'd alike to groan:
The tender for another's pain,

The unfeeling for his own.

Yet ah! why should they know their fate?
Since sorrow never comes too late,
And happiness too swiftly flies.
Thought would destroy their Paradise.
No more; where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.

THE PROGRESS OF POESY.

AWAKE, Æolian lyre, awake,

And give to rapture all thy trembling strings.
From Helicon's harmonious springs

A thousand rills their mazy progress take:
The laughing flowers, that round them blow,
Drink life and fragrance as they flow.
Now the rich stream of music winds along,
Deep, majestic, smooth, and strong,
Through verdant vales, and Ceres' golden reign:
Now rolling down the steep amain,
Headlong, impetuous, see it pour:

The rocks and nodding groves rebellow to the roar.
Oh! sovereign of the willing soul!
Parent of sweet and solemn-breathing airs,
Enchanting shell! the sullen cares

And frantic passions hear thy soft control;
On Thracia's hills the lord of war

Has curb'd the fury of his car,

And dropp'd his thirsty lance at thy command:
Perching on the scepter'd hand

Of Jove, thy magic lulls the feather'd king
With ruffled plumes, and flagging wing:
Quench'd in dark clouds of slumber lie

The terror of his beak and lightning of his eye.

Thee the voice, the dance, obey,

Temper'd to thy warbled lay.

O'er Idalia's velvet-green

The rosy-crown'd Loves are seen

On Cytherea's day,

With antic sports and blue-eyed pleasures,
Frisking light in frolic measures;
Now pursuing, now retreating,

Now in circling troops they meet:
To brisk notes, in cadence beating,
Glance their many-twinkling feet.

Slow melting strains their queen's approach declare:
Where'er she turns, the Graces homage pay.
With arms sublime, that float upon the air,
In gliding state she wins her easy way:
O'er her warm cheek and rising bosom move
The bloom of young Desire and purple light of Love.

Man's feeble race what ills await,

Labour, and Penury, the racks of Pain,
Disease, and Sorrow's weeping train,

And Death, sad refuge from the storms of Fate! The fond complaint, my song, disprove,

And justify the laws of Jove.

Say, has he given in vain the heavenly Muse?

Night, and all her sickly dews,

Her spectres wan, her birds of boding cry,

He gives to range the dreary sky;

Till down the eastern cliffs afar

Hyperion's march they spy, and glittering shafts of

war.

In climes beyond the solar road,

Where shaggy forms. o'er ice-built mountains roam, The Muse has broke the twilight gloom,

To cheer the shivering native's dull abode.

And oft, beneath the odorous shade

Of Chili's boundless forests laid,

She deigns to hear the savage youth repeat,

In loose numbers wildly sweet,

Their feather-cinctured chiefs and dusky loves.
Her track, where'er the goddess roves,

Glory pursue, and generous Shame,

Th' unconquerable mind, and Freedom's holy flame.

Woods that wave o'er Delphi's steep,
Isles that crown the Egean deep,

Fields that cool Ilissus laves,

Or where Mæander's amber waves

In lingering labyrinths creep,

How do your tuneful echoes languish,
Mute but to the voice of Anguish?
Where each old poetic mountain
Inspiration breathed around:
Every shade and hallow'd fountain
Murmur'd deep a solemn sound :
Till the sad Nine, in Greece's evil hour,

Left their Parnassus for the Latian plains.
Alike they scorn the pomp of tyrant-power,

And coward Vice that revels in her chains. When Latium had her lofty spirit lost,

They sought, oh Albion! next thy sea-encircled coast.

Far from the sun and summer-gale,
In thy green lap was Nature's darling laid,
What time, where lucid Avon stray'd,

To him the mighty mother did unveil

Her awful face: The dauntless child
Stretch'd forth his little arms, and smiled.

"This pencil take," she said, "whose colours clear Richly paint the vernal year:

Thine too these golden keys, immortal boy!

This can unlock the gates of Joy,

Of Horror that, and thrilling fears,

Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic tears."

Nor second he, that rode sublime Upon the seraph-wings of Ecstasy, The secrets of th' abyss to spy.

He pass'd the flaming bounds of place and time : The living throne, the sapphire-blaze,

Where angels tremble while they gaze,

He saw but, blasted with excess of light,

Closed his eyes in endless night.

Behold, where Dryden's less presumptuous car

Wide o'er the fields of glory bare

Two coursers of ethereal race,

With necks in thunder clothed, and long-resounding

pace.