Poems on Several Occasions With Anne Boleyn to King Henry VIII. An Epistle. By Mrs. Elizabeth Tollet. The Second Edition |
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Imitation of Horace, Lib. II. Ode 3.
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 | Poems on Several Occasions |  |
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Imitation of Horace, Lib. II. Ode 3.
Æquam memento rebus in arduis
Servare mentem ------
Servare mentem ------
I.
Why thus dejected? can you hope a CureIn mourning Ills which you endure?
Without Redress you grieve:
A melancholy Thought may sour
The Pleasures of the present Hour,
But never can the Past retrieve.
Who knows if more remain for Fate to give?
Unerring Death alike on all attends;
Alike our Hopes and Fears destroys:
Alike one silent Period ends
All our repining Griefs and our insulting Joys.
II.
Not thy Expence, nor thy Physicians SkillCan guard thee from the Stroak of Fate:
Thou yield'st to some imaginary Ill
Thy very Fears of Death create.
With the fantastick Spleen oppress'd,
With Vapour's wilder Indolence possess'd,
Thy stagnant Blood forgets to roll,
And Fate attacks thee from thy inward Soul.
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To some remote, some rural Seat;
Where on the Grass reclin'd we may
Make ev'ry Day an Holy-day:
Where all to our Delights combine,
With Friendship, Wit, and chearful Wine.
III.
Where the tall Poplar and aspiring PineTheir hospitable Branches twine:
Among their Roots a silver Current strays,
Which wand'ring here and there, its Course delays,
And in Mæanders forms its winding Ways.
Perfumes, and Wine, and Roses bring!
The short-liv'd Treasures of the Spring!
While Wealth can give, or Youth can use,
While that can purchase, this excuse,
Let's live the present Now!
'Tis all the fatal Sisters may allow.
Tho' thou should'st purchase an immense Estate,
Tho' the clear Mirror of the rolling Tide
Reflect thy Villa's rising Pride,
And Forest shading either Side;
Yet must thou yield to Fate:
To these shall thy unthankful Heir succeed;
And waste the heapy Treasures of the Dead.
IV.
Nor shall it aid thee then to traceThy Ancestors beyond the Norman Race:
Death, the great Leveller of all Degrees,
Does on Mankind without Distinction seize.
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The mighty Tyrant to repel;
Nor does his Cruelty disdain
The lab'ring Hind and weary Swain,
Who in obscure Oblivion dwell.
When from the fated Urn the Lot is cast,
The Doom irrevocable past,
Still on the Brink the shiv'ring Ghosts wou'd stay:
Imperious Fate brooks no Delay;
The Steersman calls, away! away!
| Poems on Several Occasions | |