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And adding, as you climb Discovery's hill,
The scholar's learning to the sculptor's skill;
Those years that roll'd o'er thee with luftre kind,
Rip'ning thy labours much, and more thy mind, .
Those years, that gave thy faculties to shine,
In mists of malady enshrouded mine.

Think with what grief the spirit of thy friend,
Anxious as thine, but anxious to no end,
Year after year, of feverish floth the prey,
Has feen each project of his mind decay,

And drop, like buds that, (when the parent rose,
Sick'ning in drought where no kind current flows,
Feels parching heat its genial powers enthrall,)
Unblown, unscented, and discolour'd, fall.

Difeafe, dread fiend! whatever name thou bear,

I most abhor thee as the child of Care;
Nor fix'd of feature, nor of ftation fure,
Thy power as noxious as thy shape obscure;
While thy cold vapours, with a baleful ġloom,

Blight intellectual fruits howe'er they bloom:

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Yet e'en o'er thee, in thy defpotic hours,

When thou haft chain'd the mind's excurfive powers,

Though to thy gloomy keep by pain betray'd,

That mind can triumph by celestial aid :

From thee, dull monitor! e'en then can learn
A mental leffon of moft high concern-

To know the fuffering fpirit's fure resource,

And hail the hallow'd fount of human force.

God of those grateful hearts that own thy fway,

Howe'er their fibres flourish or decay,

Safe in thy goodness, with no will but thine,

Thy deareft gifts I cherish or refign!

Yet, if by storms of many a season tried,

And tofs'd, not funk, by life's uncertain tide,

I yet may view, benevolently gay,

A brighter evening to my darken'd day :

Grace it, bleft Power! whate'er its date may be,
With luftre worthy of a gift from thee!

Poets, dear Sculptor! who to fame aspire,

Fearless pretend to inspiration's fire.

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We boast of Mufes, who, without reward,

Furnish the favour'd harp with golden chord :
Yet, to be frank, though penfive from my youth,
I play'd with Fiction as a child of Truth.
When my free mind in health's light veft was clad,
A feeling heart was all the lyre I had :
But quick as Memnon's statue felt the day,
And spoke refponfive to the rifing ray;
So quick the fibres of that heart I deem,
Of excellence, new rifen, to feel the beam;

Feel the pure light a vocal transport raise,

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And fondly hail it with melodious praise.
But Pain, dear Flaxman! the dull tyrant Pain,

A new Cambyfes, broke this lyre in twain :

Still, like the ftatue fever'd on the ground,

Though weaker, ftill its wonted voice is found:

Warm'd by that light they love, the very fragments

found *.

* See NOTE I.

O could the texture of this suffering brain
The pleafing toil of patient thought fuftain,
Unwearied now, as when in Granta's fhade
Friendship endear'd the rites to Learning paid;
When keen for action, whether weak or strong,
My mind difdain'd repofe; and to prolong
The literary day's too brief delight,
Affign'd to social study half the night!
With ardour then, proportion'd to thy own,
My verfe, dear Flaxman! in a louder tone
Should lead thy country, with a parent's hope,
To give thy talents animating scope;

Pleas'd, ere thy genius its beft record frame,
To found a prelude to thy future fame.

But worn with anguish, may thy bard command
Such notes as flow'd fpontaneous from his hand
In that bleft hour, when his applauded Muse,

Fond of no theme but what his heart might choose,
Appear'd that heart's ambitious hope to crown,

The happy herald of a friend's renown;

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When Truth re-echoed her ingenuous praise,
And our lov❜d Romney triumph'd in her lays.

The Arts and Friendship are angelic powers,
Worshipp'd by me through all my chequer'd hours;
My early offerings at their feet I cast:

Be theirs my prefent fong, and theirs my laft!

If Health to him, who oft, with fruitless fighs,
Watches the glance of her averted eyes,

Those eyes, whose light can wither'd minds renew,
Those stars, that shed an intellectual dew-

If Health will yet her inspiration give,

Call into life my verse, and bid it live!

Years that, like visions, vanish all by stealth,
When Time is dancing to the harp of Health—
But long, long links of an oppressive chain,
When his dull steps are told by laffitude and pain
Years have elaps'd fince, full of hope for thee,

Thy bard, though wreck'd on Study's restless sea,

IIO

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