The Season described as it affects the various parts of Nature. Of uncorrupted Man, nor blush'd to see Or to the cheerful tendance of the flock. 245 Meantime the song went round; and dance and sport, Wisdom and friendly talk, succesive, stole Their hours away. While in the rosy vale Love breath'd his infant sighs, from anguish free, And full replete with bliss; save the sweet pain, Nor yet injurious act, nor surly deed, 250 Was known among those happy sons of Heaven; 255 For reason and benevolence were law. Harmonious Nature too look'd smiling on; Clear shone the skies, cool'd with eternal gales, 260 The Season described as it affects the various parts of Nature Was meekened, and he join'd his sullen joy; 265 Soft sigh'd the flute; the tender voice was heard, In consonance. Such were those prime of days. 270 But now those white unblemished manners, whence The fabling poets took their golden age, Are found no more amid these iron times, These dregs of life! Now the distemper'd mind Is off the poise within: the passions all Have burst their bounds; and reason half extinct, 275 Or impotent, or else approving, sees The foul disorder. Senseless, and deform'd, Convulsive anger storms at large; or pale, And silent, settles into fell revenge. Base envy withers at another's joy, 280 285 The Season described as it affects the various parts of Nature. A pensive anguish pining at the heart; From ever-changing views of good and ill, 290 295 Form'd infinitely various, vex the mind With endless storm: whence, deeply rankling, grows The partial thought, a listless unconcern, 300 Cold, and averting from our neighbour's good; Then dark disgust, and hatred, winding wiles, Coward deceit, and ruffian violence : At last, extinct each social feeling, fell, And joyless inhumanity pervades 305 And petrifies the heart. Nature disturb'd Is deem'd, vindictive, to have chang'd her course. 310 The Season described as it affects the various parts of Nature, With universal burst, into the gulph; And o'er the high-pil'd hills of fractur'd earth 315 The Seasons since have, with severer sway, Oppress'd a broken world: the Winter keen Shook forth his waste of snows; and Summer shot His pestilential heats. Great Spring, before Green'd all the year; and fruits and blossoms blush'd, In social sweetness, on the self-same bough. Pure was the temperate air; an even calm Perpetual reign'd, save what the zephyrs bland 325 Breath'd o'er the blue expanse; for then nor storms 330 The Season described as it affects the various parts of Nature. Our drooping days are dwindled down to nought, And yet the wholesome herb neglected dies; 335 340 And worse. The wolf, who from the nightly fold Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast. But Man, whom Nature form'd of milder clay, With every kind emotion in his heart, And taught alone to weep; while from her lap 350 She pours ten thousand delicacies, herbs, And fruits, as numerous as the drops of rain Or beams that gave them birth: shall he, fair form! Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on Heaven, |