And elegance of life. Nor happiness
Domeftic, mix'd of tenderness and care,
Nor moral excellence, nor focial blifs,
Nor guardian law were his; nor various skill
To turn the furrow, or to guide the tool.
Mechanic; nor the heaven-conducted prow
Of navigation bold, that fearless braves
The burning line, nor dares the wint'ry pole;
Mothhr fevere of infinite delights!
Nothing, fave rapine, indolence, and guile,
And woes on woes, a ftill-revolving train!
Whofe horrid circle had made human life
That non-existence worfe: but, taught by thee,
Ours are the plans of policy and peace;
To live like brothers, and conjunctive all
Embellish life. While thus laborious crowds
Ply the tough oar, philofophy directs
The ruling helm; or like the liberal breath
Of potent heaven, invifible, the fail
Swells out, and bears th' inferior world along.
Nor to this evanefcent speck of earth
Poorly confin'd, the radiant tracts on high

Are her exalted range; intent to gaze
Creation through; and, from that full compler
Of never-ending wonders, to conceive
Of the Sole Being right, who spoke the word,
And Nature mov'd complete. With inward view,
Thence on th' ideal kingdom fwift she turns
Her eye; and inftant, at her powerful glance,
Th' obedient phantoms vanish or appear;
Compound, divide, and into order shift,
Each to his rank, from plain perception up
To the fair forms of fancy's fleeting train:
To reason then, deducing truth from truth;
And notion quite abftract; where first begins
The world of spirits, action all, and life
Unfetter'd, and unmixt. But here the cloud,
So wills Eternal Providence, fits deep.
Enough for us to know that this dark state,
In wayward paffions loft, and vain pursuits,
This infancy of being, cannot prove
The final iffue of the works of God,
By boundless love and perfect wisdom form'd,
And ever rifing with the rifing mind.

CROWN'D with the fickle and the wheaten fheaf,
While Autumn, nodding o'er the yellow plain,
Comes jovial on: the Doric reed once more,
Well pleas'd, I tune. Whate'er the Wintery froft
Nitrous prepar'd; the various-blotiom'd spring
Put in white promise forth and Summer funs
Concocted ftrong, rush boundless now to view,
Full, perfect all, and fwell my glorious theme.

Onflow! the mufe, ambitious of thy name,
To grace, infpire and dignify her fong,
Would from the public voice thy gentle ear
A while engage. Thy noble care fhe knows,
The patriot virtues that diftend thy thought,
Spread on thy front, and in thy bofom glow;
While liftening fenates hang upon thy tongue,
Devolving through the maze of eloquence
A roll of periods fweeter than her fong.
But the too pants for public virtue; the
Though weak in power, yet ftrong in ardent will,
Whene'er her country rufhes on her heart,
Affumes a bolder note, and fondly tries
To mix the patriot's with the poet's dame.

When the bright virgin gives the beauteous day And Libra weighs in equal fcales the year; From heaven's high cope the fierce effulgen Of parting Summer, a ferener blue, With golden light enliven'd, wide invests The happy world. Attemper'd funs arife, Sweet-beam'd, and fhedding oft through lucid clot A pleafing calm; while broad, and brown, belo Extenfive harvest hang the heavy head. Rich, filent, deep, they fland; for not a gale Rolls its light billows o'er the bending plain : A calm for plenty! till the ruffled air Falls from its poife, and gives the breeze to blow Rent is the fleecy mantle of the sky; The clouds fly different; and the fudden fun By fits effulgent gilds th' illumin'd field, And black by fits the fhadows fweep along. A gaily-checker'd heart-expanding view, Far as the circling eye can shoot around, Unbounded toffing in a flood of corn.

Thefe are thy bleffings, Industry! rough powe Whom labour ftill attends, and fweat, and pain

Yet the kind fource of every gentle art,
And all the foft civility of life:
Raifer of human kind! by Nature cast,
Naked, and helplefs, out amid the woods
And wilds, to rude inclement elements;
With various feeds of art deep in the mind
Implanted, and profufely pour'd around
Materials infinite; but idle all.

Still unexerted, in th' unconfcious breast,
Siept the lethargic powers; corruption ftill,
Voracious, fwallow'd what the liberal hand
Of bounty fcatter'd o'er the favage year:
And fill the fad barbarian, roving, mix'd
With beats of prey; or for his acorn-méal
Fought the fierce tuky boar; a fhivering wretch!
Aghat, and comfortlefs, when the bleak north,
With Winter charg'd, let the mixt tempest fly,
Hail, rain, and fnow, and bitter-breathing froft:
Then to the shelter of the hut he fled;
And the wild feafon, fordid, pin'd away.
For home he had not; home is the resort
Of love, of joy, of peace and plenty, where,
Supported and fupported, polish'd friends,
And dear relations mingle into blifs.
But this rugged favage never felt,
Ev'n defolate in crowds; and thus his days
Roli'd heavy, dark, and unenjoy'd along :
A wafte of time; till induftry approach'd,
And rous'd him from his miferable floth:
His faculties unfolded; pointed out
Where lavish Nature the directing hand
Of Art demanded; fhow'd him how to raise
His feeble force by the mechanic powers,
To dig the mineral from the vaulted earth,
On what to turn the piercing rage of fire,
On what the torrent, and the gather'd blast;
Gave the tall ancient foreft to his axe;
Taught him to chip the wood, and hew the stone,
Till by degrees the finish'd fabric rofe;
Tore from his limbs the blood-polluted fur,
And wrapt

them in the woolly vestment warm,
Or bright in gloffy filk, and flowing lawn;
With whole fome viands fill'd his table, pour'd
The generous glafs around, infpir'd to wake
The life refining foul of decent wit:

Nor ftop'd at barren bare neceffity;
But, fill advancing bolder, led him on

To

And happy. Nurfe of art! the city rear'd
In beauteous pride her tower-encircled head;
And, ftretching street on ftreet, by thousands drew,
From twining woody haunts, or the tough yew
To bows ftrong-straining, her aspiring fons.

Then commerce brought into the public walk The bufy merchant; the big warehouse built; Rais'd the ftrong crane; chok'd up the loaded ftreet

With foreign plenty; and thy ftream, O Thames,
Large, gentle, deep, majeftic, king of floods!
Chofe for his grand refort. On either hand,
Like a long wintery foreft, groves of mafts
Shot up their fpires; the bellying sheet between
Poffefs'd the breezy void; the footy hulk
Steer'd fuggish on; the fplendid barge along
Row'd, regular, to harmony; around,

The boat, light fkimming, flretch'd its oary wings;
While deep the various voice of fervent toil
From bank to bank increas'd; whence ribb'd with

oak

To bear the British thunder, black, and bold,
The roaring veffel rush'd into the main.

Then too the pillar'd dome, magnific, heav'd
Its ample roof; and luxury within [fmooth,
Pour'd out her glittering ftores; the canvas
With glowing life protuberant, to the view
Embodied rofe; the ftatue feem'd to breathe,
And foften into flesh, beneath the touch
Of forming art, imagination-flush'd.

All is the gift of industry; whate'er
Exalts, embellishes, and renders life
Delightful. Penfive Winter cheer'd by him
Sits at the focial fire, and happy hears
Th' excluded tempeft idly rave along;
His harden'd fingers deck the gaudy Spring;
Without him Summer were an arid waste;
Nor to th' autumnal months could thus transmit
Thofe full, mature, immeasurable stores,
That, waving round, recal my wandering fong.

Soon as the morning trembles o'er the fky,
And, unperceiv'd, unfolds the spreading day;
Before the ripen'd field the reapers ftand,
In fair array; each by the lafs he loves,
To bear the rougher part, and mitigate
By nameless gentle offices her toil.

At once they stoop and fwell the lufty fheaves;
While through their cheerful band the rural talk,
The rural fcandal, and the rural jeft,
Fly harmless to deceive the tedious time,
And fleal unfelt the fultry hours away.
Behind the mafter walks, builds up the fhocks;
And, confcious, glancing oft on every fide
His fated eye, feels his heart heave with joy.
The gleaners fpread around, and here and there,
Spike after fpike, their fcanty harvest pick.
Be not too narrow, husbandmen! but fling
From the full fheaf, with charitable stealth,
The liberal handful. Think, oh, grateful think!
How good the God of harveft is to you;
Who pours abundance o'er your flowing fields;
While thefe unhappy partners of your kind
Wide-hover round you like the fowls of heaven,
And afk their humble dole. The various turns
Of fortune ponder; that your fons may want
What now, with hard reluctance, faint, ye give..
The lovely young Lavinia once had friends;
And fortune fmil'd, deceitful, on her birth.

For, in her helplefs years depriv'd of all,
Of every stay, fave innocence and heaven,
She, with her widow'd mother, feeble, old,
And poor, liv'd in a cottage, far retir'd
Among the windings of a woody vale;
By folitude and deep furrounding fhades,
But more by bafhful modefty, conceal'd.
Together thus they fhunn'd the cruel fcorn
Which virtue, funk to poverty, would meet
From giddy paffion and low-minded pride:
Almoft on Nature's common bounty fed;
Like the gay birds that fung them to repofe,
Content, and carelefs of to-morrow's fare.
Her form was fresher than the morning rofe,
When the dew wets its leaves; unftain'd and pure,
As is the lily, or the mountain fnow.
The modeft virtues mingled in her eyes,
Still on the ground dejected, darting all
Their humid beams into the blooming flowers:
Or when the mournful tale her mother told,
Of what her faithlefs fortune promis'd once,
Thrill'd in her thought, they, like the dewy star
Of evening, fhone in tears. A native grace
Sat fair-proportion'd on her polish'd limbs,
Veil'd in a fimple robe, their best attire,
Beyond the pomp of drefs; for loveliness
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is, wher unadorn'd, adorn'd the most.
Thoughtlefs of beauty, fhe was beauty's felf,
Reclufe amid the clofe-embowering woods.
As in the hollow breaft of Appenine,
Beneath the shelter of encircling hills
A myrtle rifes, far from human eye,
And breathes its balmy fragrance o'er the wild;
So flourish'd blooming, and unfeen by all,
*The sweet Lavinia; till, at length, compell'd
By strong neceflity's fupreme command,
With fmiling patience in her looks, fhe went
To glean Palemon's fields. The pride of fwains
Palemon was, the generous, and the rich;
Who Id the rural life in all its joy
And elegance, fuch as Arcadain fong
Tranfmits from ancient uncorrupted times;
When tyrant custom had not fhaekled man,
But free to follow nature was the mode.
He then, his fancy with autumnal scenes
Amufing, chanc'd befide his reaper-train
To walk, when poor Lavinia drew his eye;
Unconscious of her power, and turning quick
With unaffected blufhes from his gaze:
He faw her charming, but he faw not half
The charms her downcaft modefty conceal'd.
That very moment love and chaste defire
Sprung in his bofom, to himself unknown;
For ftill the world prevail'd, and its dread laugh,
Which fearce the firm philofopher can fcorn,
Should his heart own a gleaner in the field:
And thus in fecret to his foul he figh'd.

"What pity! that fo delicate a form, "By beauty kindled, where enlivening fenfe "And more than vulgar goodness seem to dwell, "Should be devoted to the rude embrace "Of fome indecent clown! She looks, methinks, "Of old Acafto's line; and to my mind "Recals that patron of my happy life, "From whom my liberal fortune took its rife; "Now to the duft gone down; his houfes, lands, "And once fair-fpreading family, dissolv’d.

""Tis faid that in fome lone obfcure retreat, "Urg'd by remembrance fad, and decent pride, "Far from thofe fcenes which knew their better "His aged widow and his daughter live, [days, "Whom yet my fruitlefs fearch could never find, "Romantic with! would this the daughter were!"

When, ftrict inquiring, from herself he found She was the fame, the daughter of his friend, Of bountiful Acaflo; who can fpeak

The mingled paffions that furpris'd his heart,
And through his nerves in fhivering transport ran?
Then blaz'd his fmother'd flame, avow'd, and bold;
And as he view'd her, ardent, o'er and o'er,
Love, gratitude, and pity, wept at once.
Confus'd, and frighten'd at his fudden tears,
Her rifing beauties flufh'd a higher bloom,
As thus Palemon, paffionate and just,
Pour'd out the pious rapture of his foul.

"And art thou then Acafto's dear remains? "She, whom my restlefs gratitude has fought "So long in vain? O, heavens! the very fame, "The foften'd image of my noble friend, "Alive his every look, his every feature, "More elegantly touch'd. Sweeter than Spring! "Thou fole furviving bloffom from the root "That nourish'd up my fortune! Say, ah where "In what fequefter'd defert, haft thou drawn "The kindeft afpect of delighted heaven? "Into fuch beauty fpread, and blown so fair; "Though poverty's cold wind, and crushing rain, "Be keen, and heavy, on thy tender years? "O let me now, into a richer foil, [howers "Transplant thee fafe! where vernal funs, and "Diffufe their warmeft, largeft influence; "And of my garden be the pride, and joy! "Ill it befits thee, oh, it ill befits "Acafto's daughter, his whofe open stores, "Though vaft, were little to his ampler heart, "The father of a country thus to pick "The very refufe of thofe harvest-fields, "Which from his bounteous friendship I enjoy "Then throw that fhameful pittance from thy "hand,

"But ill apply'd to fuch a rugged tafk; "The fields, the mafter, all, my fair, are thine; "If to the various bleffings which thy houfe "Has on me lavish'd, thou wilt add that blifs, "That deareft blifs, the power of blefling thee!"

Here ceas'd the youth, yet ftill his fpeaking eye Exprefs'd the facred triumph of his foul, With confcious virtue, gratitude, and love, Above the vulgar joy divinely rais'd. Nor waited he reply. Won by the charm Of goodnefs irrefiftible, and all

[away

In fweet diforder loft, fhe blufh'd confent.
The news immediate to her mother brought,
While, pierc'd with anxious thought, the pin'd
The lonely moments for Lavinia's fate;
Amaz'd, and fearce believing what he heard,
Joy feiz'd her wither'd veins, and one bright gleam
Of fetting life fhone on her evening hours:
Not lefs enraptur'd than the happy pair;
Who flourish'd long in tender blifs, and rear'd
A numerous offspring, lovely like themselves,
And good, the grace of all the country round.
Defeating oft the labours of the year,
The fultry fouth collects a potent blaft.
At first, the groves are scarcely feen to stir

Their trembling tops; and a ftill murmur runs
Along the foft-inclining fields of corn.
But as th' aerial tempeft fuller fwells,
And in one mighty fiream, invisible,
Immenfe, the whole excited atmosphere,
Impetuous rufhes o'er the founding world:
Strain'd to the root, the ftooping forest pours
A raftling fhower of yet untimely leaves,
High-beat, the circling mountains eddy in,
From the bare wild, the diffipated ftorm,
And fend it in a torrent down the vale.
Expos'd, and naked, to its utmost rage,
Through all the fea of harveft rolling round,
The billowy plain floats wide; nor can evade,
Though pliant to the blast, its feizing force;
Or whirl'd in air, or into vacant chaff

Shook wate. And fometimes too a burst of rain,
Swept from the black horizon, broad, defcends
In one continuous flood. Still over head
The mingling tempeft weaves its gloom, and still
The deluge deepens; till the fields around
Lie funk, and flatted, in the fordid wave.
Madden, the ditches fwell; the meadows swim.
Red, from the hills, innumerable ftreams
Tumultuous roar; and high above its banks
The river lift; before whofe rufhing tide,
Herds, flocks, and harvests, cottages, and fwains,
ful mingled down; all that the winds had fpar'd
one wild moment ruin'd; the big hopes,
And well-earn'd treafures of the painful year.
ed to fome eminence, the husbandman
Helpless beholds the miferable wreck
Driving along; his drowning ox at once
ending, with his labours fcatter'd round,
e fees; and inftant o'er his fhivering thought
Comes Winter unprovided, and a train

clamant children dear. Ye mafters, then, mindful of the rough laborious hand, hat finks you foft in elegance and eafe; mindful of thofe limbs in ruffet clad, Whole toil to yours is warmth, and graceful pride; And, oh! be mindful of that fparing board, Which covers yours with luxury profufe, Makes your glafs fparkle, and your fenfe rejoice! Nar cruelly demand what the deep rains And all-involving winds have fwept away.

Here the rude clamour of the sportsman's joy, The gun faft-thundering, and the winded horn, Would tempt the mufe to fing the rural game: Bow, in his mid-career, the spaniel ftruck, la, by the tainted gale, with open nose,

-tretch'd, and finely fenfible, draws full, Fearful, and cautious, on the latent prey; As in the fun the circling covey bask Their varied plumes, and watchful every way, Through the rough ftubble turn the fecret eye. ught in the meshy fnare, in vain they beat Their idle wings, entangled more and more:

on the furges of the boundless air, Though borne triumphant, are they fafe; the gun, Gane'd juft, and fudden, from the fowler's eye Oertakes their founding pinions; and again,

mediate, brings them from the towering wing, Brad to the ground; or drives them wide-difpers'd, Wounded, and wheeling various, down the wind. Thefe are not fubjects for the peaceful mufe, Nor will the ftain with fuch her fpotlefs fong; Then moft delighted, when the focial fees

The whole mix'd animal-creation round,
Alive, and happy. "Tis not joy to her,
This falfely-cheerful barbarous game of death;
This rage of pleasure, which the restless youth
Awakes, impatient, with the gleaming morn;
When beafts of prey retire, that all night long,
Urg'd by neceflity, had rang'd the dark,
As if their confcious ravage fhun'd the light,
Afham'd. Not fo the fteady tyrant man,
Who with the thoughtlefs infolence of power
Inflam'd, beyond the moft infuriate wrath
Of the worst monster that e'er roam'd the waste,
For fport alone purfues the cruel chafe,
Amid the beamings of the gentle days.
Upbraid, ye ravening tribes, our wanton rage,
For hunger kindles you, and lawless want;
But lavish fed, in Nature's bounty roll'd,
To joy at anguish, and delight in blood,
Is what your horrid bofoms never knew.

Poor is the triumph o'er the timid hare!
Scar'd from the corn, and now to fome lone feat
Retir'd: the rufhy fen; the ragged furze,
Stretch'd o'er the ftony heath; the ftubble chapt
The thiftly lawn; the thick entangled broom;
Of the fame friendly hue, the wither'd fern;
The fallow ground laid open to the fun,
Concoctive; and the nodding fandy bank,
Hung o'er the mazes of the mountain brook.
Vain is her beft precaution; though the fits
Conceal'd, with folded ears; unfleeping eyes,
By Nature rais'd to take th' horizon in;
And head couch'd clofe betwixt her hairy feet,
In act to spring away. The fcented dew
Betrays her early labyrinth; and deep,
In fcatter'd fullen openings, far behind,
With every breeze the hears the coming ftorm.
But nearer, and more frequent, as it loads
The fighing gale, the fprings amaz'd, and all
The favage foul of game is up at once:
The pack full-opening, various; the fhrill horn
Refounded from the hills; the neighing fteed,
Wild for the chafe; and the loud hunter's fhout;
O'er a weak, harmless, flying creature, all
Mix'd in mad tumult, and difcordant joy.

The ftag, too, fingled from the herd, where long He rang'd the branching monarch of the fhades, Before the tempeft drives. At first, in fpeed He, fprightly, puts his faith; and, rous'd by fear, Gives all his fwift aerial foul to flight; Against the breeze he darts, that way the more To leave the leffening murderous cry behind: Deception fhort! though fleeter than the winds Blown o'er the keen-air'd mountains by the north, He burfts the thickets, glances through the glades, And plunges deep into the wildest wood; If flow, yet fure, adhesive to the track Hot-fteaming, up behind him come again Th' inhuman route, and from the fhady depth Expel him, circling through his every fhift. He fweeps the foreft oft; and fobbing fees The glades, mild opening to the golden day; Where, in kind conteft, with his butting friends He wont to struggle, or his loves enjoy. Oft in the full-defcending flood he tries To lofe the fcent, and lave his burning fides: Oft feeks the herd; the watchful herd, alarm'd, With felfifh care avoid a brother's woe.

What fhall he do? His once fo vivid nerves,