The foul diforder. Senseless, and deform'd,
Convulfive anger ftorms at large; or pale,
And filent, fettles into fell revenge.
Bafe envy withers at another's joy,
And hates that excellence it cannot reach.
Defponding fear, of feeble fancies full,
Weak and unmanly, loosens every power.
Ev'n love itself is bitterness of soul,
A penfive anguifh pining at the heart;
Or, funk to fordid interest, feels no môre
That noble with, that never-cloy'd defire,
Which, selfish joy disdaining, seeks alone
To blefs the dearer object of its flame.
Hope fickens with extravagance; and grief,
Of life impatient, into madness fwells;
Or in dead filence wastes the weeping hours.
These, and a thoufand mixt emotions more,
From ever-changing views of good and ill,
Form'd infinitely various, vex the mind
With endless storm whence, deeply rankling, grows
The partial thought, a listlefs unconcern,
Cold, and averting from our neighbour's good;
Then dark difguft, and hatred, winding wiles,
Coward deceit, and ruffian violence:
At last, extinct each social feeling, fell
And joyless inhumanity pervades
And petrifies the heart. Nature disturb'd
Is deem'd, vindictive, to have chang'd her courfe.
Hence, in old dusky time, a deluge came :
When the deep-cleft difparting orb, that arch'd
The central waters round, impetuous rush'd,
With universal burft, into the gulph,
And o'er the high-pil'd hills of fractur'd earth
Wide dash'd the waves, in undulation vast;
Till, from the center to the ftreaming clouds,
A fhoreless ocean tumbled round the globe.
The Seasons fince have, with feverer fway, Opprefs'd a broken world: the Winter keen Shook forth his waste of snows; and Summer fhot His peftilential heats. Great Spring, before, Green'd all the year; and fruits and blossoms blush'd, In focial sweetness, on the felf-fame bough.
Pure was the temperate air; an even calm
Perpetual reign'd, fave what the zephyrs bland.
Breath'd o'er the blue expanfe: for then nor ftorms
Were taught to blow, nor hurricanes to rage;
Sound slept the waters; no fulphureous glooms
Swell'd in the sky, and fent the lightning forth;
While fickly damps, and cold autumnal fogs,
Hung not, relaxing, on the springs of life.
But now, of turbid elements the sport,
From clear to cloudy toft, from hot to cold,
And dry to moift, with inward-eating change,
Our drooping days are dwindled down to nought,
Their period finish'd ere 'tis well begun,
And yet the wholesome herb neglected dies;
Though with the pure exhilarating foul
Of nutriment and health, and vital powers,
Beyond the search of art, 'tis copious bleft.
For, with hot ravine fir'd, enfanguin'd man'
Is now become the lion of the plain,
And worfe. The wolf, who from the nightly fold
Fierce drags the bleating prey, ne'er drunk her milk,
Nor wore her warming fleece: nor has the steer,
At whose strong chest the deadly tiger hangs,
E'er plough'd for him. They too are temper'd high,
With hunger ftung and wild neceffity,
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
She pours ten thousand delicacies, herbs,
And fruits, as numerous as the drops of rain
Or beams that gave them birth: fhal! he, fair form!
Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on Heaven,
E'er stoop to mingle with the prowling herd, 、 ・ ・
And dip his tongue in gore? The beast of prey,
Blood-ftain'd, deserves to bleed: but you, ye flocks,
What have ye done; ye peaceful people, what,
To merit death? you, who have given us milk
In lufcious ftreams, and lent us your own coat
Against the winter's cold? And the plain ox,
That harmless, honeft, guileless animal,
In what has he offended? he, whose toil,
Patient and ever ready, clothes the land;
With all the pomp of harvest: shall he bleed,
And struggling groan beneath the cruel hands,
Ev'n of the clown he feeds? and that, perhaps,
To fwell the riot of th' autumnal feast,
Won by his labour? Thus the feeling heart
Would tenderly fuggeft: but 'tis enough,
In this late age, adventurous, to have touch'd
Light on the numbers of the Samian sage.
High Heaven forbids the bold prefumptuous strain,
Whofe wifeft will has fix'd us in a state
That must not yet to pure perfection rife.
Now when the first foul torrent of the brooks,
Swell'd with the vernal rains, is ebb'd away,
And, whitening, down their moffy-tinctur'd ftream
Defcends the billowy foam now is the time,
While yet the dark-brown water aids the guile,
To tempt the trout. The well-diffembled fly,
The rod fine-tapering with elastic spring,
Snatch'd from the hoary feed the floating line,
And all thy flender watry stores prepare.
But let not on thy hook the tortur'd worm,
Convulhve, twift in agonizing folds ;
Which, by rapacious hunger fwallow'd deep,
Gives, as you fear it from the bleeding breaft
Of the weak helpless uncomplaining wretch,
Harsh pain, and horror to the tender hand.
When with his lively ray the potent fun Has pierc'd the ftreams, and rous'd the finny race, Then, ifsuing chearful, to thy sport repair; Chief fhould the western breezes curling play, And light o'er æther bear the fhadowy clouds. High to their fount, this day, amid the hills, And woodlands warbling round, trace up the brooks; The next, pursue their rocky-channel'd maze, Down to the river, in whose ample wave
Their little Naiads love to sport at large.
Juft in the dubious point, where with the pool
Is mix'd the trembling stream, or where it boils
Around the ftone, or from the hollow'd bank
Reverted plays in undulating flow,
There throw, nice-judging, the delufive fly;
And as you lead it round in artful curve,
With eye attentive mark the springing game.
Strait as above the furface of the flood
They wanton rise, or urg'd by hunger leap,
Then fix, with gentle twitch, the barbed hook :
Some lightly toffing to the graffy bank,
And to the shelving fhore, flow-dragging fome,
With various hand proportion'd to their force.
If yet too young, and easily deceiv'd,
A worthlefs prey fcarce bends your pliant rod,
Him, piteous of his youth and the short space
He has enjoy'd the vital light of Heaven,
Soft difengage, and back into the stream
The fpeckled captive throw. But should you
From his dark haunt, beneath the tangled roots
Of pendent trees, the monarch of the brook,
Behoves you then to ply your finest art.
Long time he, following cautious, fcans the fly;
And oft attempts to feize it, but as oft
The dimpled water speaks his jealous fear.
At last, while haply o'er the fhaded fun
Paffes a cloud, he desperate takes the death,
With fullen plunge. At once he darts along,
Deep-ftruck, and runs out all the lengthen'd line:
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