A Collection of Original Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

Bid grief, that vulture to my breast,
Sharper than what Prometheus knows,
Avaunt! and leave the bard at rest:
Grant, heav'nly maids, the wish'd repose.

158

IV

'Tis done! aloof misfortunes stand!
While ev'ry thought on you is bent;
You can the healing balm command,
Which gives the troubled mind content.

V

But the wish'd blessing will not hold,
For, oh! when I resign my pen,
Again, in mourning weeds behold!
My woe-fraught genius come again.

VI

To shield me from the gloomy scene,
To Cowper's patronage I fly;
Nor evil then shall intervene,
Nor heave the heart-extorted sigh.

VII

Merit yet never su'd in vain,
When Cowper could extend his aid,

159

Whose life is one continued train
Of virtues happily display'd.

VIII

Virtue! how seldom art thou known
In gorgeous palaces to dwell;
You oftener elevate your throne
Within the peasant's humble cell.

IX

Thither nor wealth nor titles roam,
To tempt the mind with gaudy glare,
For vice can never six her home
In poverty's rough frigid air.

X

Various the forms that you assume,
To regulate the active soul,
When the rais'd passions dare presume
The check of reason to controul.

160

XI

You teach us to avoid the shelves,
Where else our happiness were lost,
If we, abandon'd to ourselves,
On life's inconstant sea were tost.

XII

You o'er our acts discretion pour,
Adorn with unaffected grace;
As spring with a refreshing show'r
Adds gayer bloom to nature's face.

XIII

When thro' infirmity or fear,
The mind dejected falls from good,
Your presence but acknowledg'd near,
It's innate strength's again renew'd.

XIV

Or if the emanating mind
Superior soar to narrow rule,

161

You with the ties of reason bind
Ambition's slave, vain fortune's fool.

XV

So, pilots all their canvas spread,
To court the coy reluctant breeze,
When Thetis rears her dropping head,
And smiling, smooths the furrow'd seas.

XVI

Or if loud storms the sky assail,
And o'er the angry ocean sweep,
He quickly furls the flowing sail,
Or ploughs with naked poles the deep.

XVII

Virtue immortal and divine,
Surmounts the clouds of stormy fate;
Sickness and care and years combine,
In vain, against her happy mate.

162

XVIII

The God of War, with savage train,
Pours quick destruction o'er the field;
Wealth, honours, pow'r resist in vain,
Ev'n valour is compell'd to yield.

XIX

While virtue fix'd as either pole,
Indignant views the rapid race,
Above each shock, and thro' the whole
Maintains her own exalted place.

XX

Diogenes, in tub immur'd,
Laugh'd at the various turns of life,
By virtue of affliction cur'd,
Fenc'd from calamity and strife.

XXI

This clears the vitiated sight
From the false glare that shadows wealth,

163

Shews honours in a real light,
And gives the mind internal health.

XXII

Thus optic glasses help the eye,
By nature but imperfect made,
And seem to draw those objects nigh,
That in the vale of distance fade.

XXIII

What tho' a parent should neglect
Her duty, thro' some false pretence,
Shall grief for that my soul infect,
While I'm secure in innocence.

XXIV

Shall I complain if Fortune frown,
Curse the long day, or wish me dead,
When 'tis to ev'ry school-boy known,
Homer sung ballads for his bread.

164

XXV

In virtue I'll a refuge find,
A sure asylum from distress;
Virtue will nerve my ruffled mind,
And fate may frown, tho' not oppress.

XXVI

With Cowper dwells th' immortal maid,
That lifts her votary to the skies,
Her shield is probity display'd,
And peaceful happiness her prize.

To Ashley Cowper, Esq;

Occasioned by reading some Poetry of his writing.

Cowper, in some illustrious roll, shall fame,
To future times deliver down thy name,
Lov'd as a man and reverenc'd as a bard;
Nor less thy gen'rous talents should reward:

165

With strict attention on thy lines I've dwelt,
And as you painted different passions felt,
Whether you emulate Ovidian lays,
And wreath Clarissa's charms with boundless praise,
Or delicately touch th' effects of love,
That modesty may read, nor yet reprove;
Here you beyond your classic pattern rise,
Nor chaster diction Mantua's boast supplies;
And while we're taught the charmer to admire,
Tho' we are bound to own th' immortal fire,
No gross idea springs, no gross desire.

While you to Baillie modestly excuse
The want of genius, you display the Muse
Vig'rous and strong, as when by Flaccus drest,
Friendship and Wine th' Aonian Maid carest?
Thus real merit still to shades withdraws,
And blushing flies the well-deserv'd applause;
While ev'ry verse with glowing fancy teems,
All grieve that you decline the proffer'd themes.

166

Oh, more than Pope! since with benevolence,
Superior far, with wit and temper'd sense;
Free from satiric sneer and Cynic rage,
You mildly pour instruction o'er the page,
Shewing what virtue is; thus to allure
With her bright form, and make thy precepts sure,
Nor from fix'd hate, deceitfully intend
To damn the character you should commend.

Or when to lighter measures you advance,
And thro' blithe song, or merry fable dance,
My shaken sides thy hum'rous pow'r confess;
Yet ev'ry stroke so nicely you express,
With such auspicious fancy, yet so free
From vice's darling child, Impurity,
That Modesty ne'er hangs her bashful head,
No blushes o'er the virgin's visage spread.

Prior and Swift must here the bays resign
To thee, and own the excellence is thine:

167

For no loose images distain the page;
Their want of manners oft provokes my rage.

To spleen's dull province now the scene you change,
Thro' her abandon'd avenues you range;
The Muse leads on, her weary step I trace,
My pulse beats slow, and flushes dye my face;
A thousand melancholy objects croud,
Life is a burden, and my wish a shroud:
Quit, Cowper, quit the subject e'er I fall,
Ere ev'ry sense the demon's wiles enthrall;
Obedient to my wish, the varied strain
Dispels the gloom, nor gives me to complain.
The alter'd notes pour rapture to my heart,
Such is the energy of Cowper's art,
Anew I feel them all my breast inspire,
My blood run quicker, and my spirits higher;
Now from the grave, just dropping o'er its verge,
Anew created sudden I emerge.

168

Thus was it once when fam'd Timotheus sung;
All on his harmony attentive hung,
Just as he rapture or despair express'd,
The sympathetic notes their souls confess'd.

An Apology to an angry Rival, declining a Challenge.

'Tis not the fear of death, nor smart,
Makes me averse to fight,
But to preserve a faithful heart,
Not mine, but Celia's right.

Let then your anger be suppress'd;
Not me, but Celia spare;
Your sword is welcome to my breast,
When Celia is not there.

169

ADVICE to an Old Maid.

Nunc, aut nunquam.

For once, Dorinda, lend an ear,
And let the Muse advise;
Consider 'tis your fiftieth year,
A time you should be wise.
Lay washes, patches, paint aside,
Since useless these you find;
Then quit your face, and rather hide,
The wrinkles of her mind.
Your fav'rite scandal first forsake,
To censure still be slow,
Till then you must not hope t'escape
The leading apes below.

170

VERSES, from a Certain Club, to some Scriblers against it.

Ye little wits, who aim at Bays,
By venting spleen in rhymes,
Who torture dullness fifty ways,
And chuckle when it chimes.

Be kind—go on—pursue your theme,
Your scribling serves our ends;
For know that mirth is all our scheme,
And they who raise it, friends.

As such on those, we still shall look,
Who senseless satires write;
And fair transcribe 'em in a book,
To laugh at every night.

171

The CHARACTER of ---

Hic niger est—hunc, tu, Romane, caveto.
Hor.

An inveterate heart, fraught with malice and spleen,
With a face that betrays what he harbours within;
With a smile that discloses no gleam of good-nature;
With Shylock impress'd upon ev'ry feature;
With too little sense to dispose of his gall,
Where with some shew of reason the venom might fall;
Too vain of the wit, which he never possess'd,
Not to launch the dull weapon at every breast;
With envy the toad ever prompt at his ear,
To direct him when mildness and virtue appear,
“Here level the point—let it penetrate here.”
Overlooking affronts with a real intent,
Still spying them out, where they never were meant;

172

Too proud to forgive an offence, and too mean
To resent, when a shadow of danger is seen:
Still affecting to rule, with no title to pow'r,
Tho' pre-eminence does but expose him the more;
Yet a dupe to the sycophant, only caress'd
By the wretch, like himself, whom all others detest;
With the lust of a satyr, and the craft of a Jew,
With Change-alley wisdom, and wit from a stew.

Oh! Eve, had but Satan this figure put on,
This figure so nearly resembling his own,
He had then been detected, his scheme had been cross'd;
And the blessings of Eden had never been lost.

173

Florio;

or, The Plagiary.

[_]

In Imitation of Dr. Young.

But more provoking still—here comes the wight,
Who glories in the verse he cannot write;
Who anxious to procure a spurious name,
Fondly mistakes his infamy for fame;
Who to his fav'rite-self attempts to raise,
With pilfer'd song, a monument of praise;—
On his own stock, who labours not to thrive,
But lives by plund'ring th'industrious hive;
Like the rude Indian, strips the feather'd race,
With the gay spoil his meaner brow to grace;
His titles such to the poor fame he gets,
As Wards, or Japhets, were to their estates;

174

Some genius yet, it must be own'd, he had;
Yes—when at school, he was a hopeful lad;
But like too forward plants that early shoot,
Soon sapless grew, and wither'd at the root;
Yet still might pass for a consummate wit,
Allow him but those pieces Marcus writ,
Which as his own he can so well repeat.
Tun'd by his voice, how sweet the numbers flow,
Nay 'twas extempore, too, he'd have you know;
Pity—'twas writ so many years ago.
Florio, in one thing, surely does excel,
If stealing wisely's next to writing well.

175

An EPIGRAM on the same.

Florio, for thee, what wrath's in store,
Apollo's fruitful heir!
Since pilferers, however poor,
Justice is deaf to spare.