University of Virginia Library

TO CLIO.

Occasioned by her Verses on FRIENDSHIP.

While, Clio, pondering o'er thy lines I roll,
Dwell on each thought, and meditate thy soul,
Methinks I view thee, in some calm retreat,
Far from all guilt, distraction and deceit;
Thence pitying view, the thoughtless fair and gay,
Who whirl their lives in giddiness away.
Thence greatly scorning what the world calls great,
Contemn the proud, their tumults, power and state.
And deem it thence inglorious to descend
For ought below, but virtue and a friend.
How com'st thou fram'd, so different from thy sex,
Whom trifles ravish, and whom trifles vex?
Capricious things, all flutter, whim and show,
And light and varying as the winds that blow.
To candour, sense, to love, to friendship blind,
To flatterers fools, and coxcombs only kind!
Say whence those hints, those bright ideas came,
That warm thy breast with friendship's holy flame?
That close thy heart against the joys of youth,
And ope thy mind to all the rays of truth,
That with such sweetness and such grace unite,
The gay, the prudent, virtuous, and polite.
As heaven inspires thy sentiment divine,
May heaven vouchsafe a friendship worthy thine;
A friendship, plac'd where ease and fragrance reign,
Where nature sways us, and no laws restrain.
Where studious leisure, prospects unconfin'd,
And heavenly musing, lifts the aspiring mind.
There with thy friend, may years on years be spent,
In blooming health, and, ever gay, content;
There blend your cares with soft assuasive arts,
There sooth the passions, there unfold your hearts;
Join in each wish, and warming into love,
Approach the raptures of the blest above.