University of Virginia Library

Nor think the dull cold reasoners, can disprove
These varied powers of Sympathetic love;
Nor hope, ye cynics, all your skill can find
From partial spots a flaw in human kind;
As well the panther might ye charge with sin,
And call each streak a blemish on his skin;
Allow to self the broadest scope ye can,
Still breathe the social principle in man.
Oft when pride whispers that he stands alone,
His strength proceeds from other than his own;
Oft when he seems to walk the world apart,
Another's interest twines about his heart;
And call his project rash, his effort vain,
The end is social which he sighs to gain;
Or say, this builds for pomp, that digs for bread,
This shews you pictures, that a pompous bed,
This toils a niggard at his lonely trade,
That rears the bower but asks not to its shade;
That this for vanity his wealth displays,
As that for pride unravels learning's maze;
Trace but their purpose to one general end,
You see it work the good of wife, or friend,
Parent or child their privilege still claim,
And social comfort springs from what we blame,
Frailty itself our sympathy may spare,
A graceful weakness when no vice is there.
Who hopes perfection breaks down nature's fence,
And spurns the modest bounds of sober sense.
When straw-like errors lean to virtue's side.
Ah! check, ye bigots, check your furious pride.
Some venial faults, like clouds at dawn of day,
Blush as they pass, and but a moment stay;
Those venial faults from sordid natures start,
And spring up only in the generous heart,
As florid weeds elude the labourer's toil,
From too much warmth or richness of the soil;
While meaner souls, like Zembla's hills of snow,
Too barren prove for weeds or flowers to grow.