And liberal eye, fits, from his dark retreat
Inviting modeft Want. Nor, till invok'd
Can restless goodness wait: your active search
Leaves no cold wintery corner unexplor❜d;
Like filent-working Heaven, furprizing oft
The lonely heart with unexpected good.
For you the roving spirit of the wind
Blows Spring abroad; for you the teeming clouds 885
Descend in gladsome plenty o'er the world;
And the fun sheds his kindeft rays for you,
Ye flower of human race! In these green days,
Reviving Sickness lifts her languid head:
Life flows afresh; and young-ey'd Health exalts 890
The whole creation round. Contentment walks
The funny glade, and feels an inward blifs
Spring o'er his mind, beyond the power of kings
To purchase. Pure ferenity apace
Induces thought, and contemplation still.
By swift degrees the love of Nature works,
And warms the bofom; till at laft fublim'd
To rapture, and enthusiastic heat,
We feel the prefent Deity, and taste
The joy of God to see a happy world!
These are the facred feelings of thy heart,
Thy heart inform'd by reason's purer ray,
O Lyttelton the friend! thy paffions thus
And meditations vary, as at large,
Courting the Mufe, through Hagley Park thou stray'ft; Thy British Temple! There along the dale,
With woods o'er-hung, and shagg'd with moffy rocks,
Whence on each hand the gushing waters play,
And down the rough cascade white-dashing fall,
Or gleam in lengthen'd vista through the trees,
You filent fteal; or fit beneath the shade
Of folemn oaks, that tuft the fwelling mounts
Thrown graceful round by Nature's careless hand,
And penfive liften to the various voice
Of rural peace: the herds, the flocks, the birds, 915
The hollow-whispering breeze, the plaint of rills,
That, purling down amid the twisted roots
Which creep around, their dewy murmurs fhake
On the footh'd ear. From these abftracted oft,
You wander through the philofophic world ;
Where in bright train continual wonders rise,
Or to the curious or the pious eye.
And oft, conducted by hiftoric truth,
You tread the long extent of backward time:
Planning, with warm benevolence of mind,
And honeft zeal unwarp'd by party-rage,
Britannia's weal; how from the venal gulph
To raise her virtue, and her arts revive.
Or, turning thence thy view, these graver thoughts The Mufes charm: while, with fure tafte refin'd, 930 You draw th' inspiring breath of ancient fong;
Till nobly rifes, emulous, thy own.
Perhaps thy lov'd Lucinda fhares thy walk,
With foul to thine attun'd. Then Nature all
Wears to the lover's eye a look of love;
And all the tumult of a guilty world,
Toft by ungenerous paffions, finks away.
The tender heart is animated peace;
And as it pours its copious treafures forth,
In varied converse, softening every theme,
You, frequent paufing, turn, and from her eyes,
Where meeken'd fenfe, and amiable grace,
And lively fweetnefs dwell, enraptur'd, drink
That nameless spirit of ethereal joy,
Unutterable happiness! which love,
Alone, beftows, and on a favour'd few.
Meantime you gain the height, from whofe fair brow The bursting profpect fpreads immenfe around:
And fnatch'd o'er hill and dale, and wood and lawn, And verdant field, and darkening heath between, 950 And villages embofom'd foft in trees,
And fpiry towns by furging columns mark'd
Of houfhold smoke, your eye excurfive roams :
Wide-ftretching from the Hall, in whose kind haunt
The Hofpitable Genius lingers ftill,
To where the broken landskip, by degrees,
Afcending, roughens into rigid hills;
O'er which the Cambrian mountains, like far clouds
That skirt the blue horizon, dufky rise.
Flush'd by the spirit of the genial year,
Now from the virgin's cheek a fresher bloom
Shoots, lefs and lefs, the live carnation round;
Her lips blush deeper fweets; the breathes of youth;
The fhining moisture fwells into her eyes,
In brighter flow; her wishing bofom heaves,
With palpitations wild; kind tumults feize
Her veins, and all her yielding foul is love.
D 2
From the keen gaze her lover turns away,
Full of the dear extatic power, and fick
With fighing languifhment. Ah then, ye fair!
Be greatly cautious of your fliding hearts :
Dare not th' infectious figh; the pleading look,
Downcaft, and low, in meek fubmiffion dreft,
But full of guile. Let not the fervent tongue,
Prompt to deceive, with adulation smooth,
Gain on your purpos'd will. Nor in the bower,
Where woodbines flaunt, and rofes fhed a couch,
While Evening draws her crimson curtains round,
Truft your soft minutes with betraying Man.
And let th' afpiring youth beware of love,
Of the smooth glance beware; for 'tis too late,
When on his heart the torrent-foftnefs pours.
Then wifdom proftrate lies, and fading fame
Diffolves in air away; while the fond foul,
Wrapt in gay visions of unreal bliss,
Still paints th' illufive form; the kindling grace;
Th' inticing fmile; the modeft-feeming eye,
Beneath whofe beauteous beams, belying heaven,
Lurk fearchlefs cunning, cruelty, and death:
And ftill falfe-warbling in his cheated ear,
Her fyren voice, enchanting, draws him on
To guileful fhores, and meads of fatal joy.
Ev'n prefent, in the very lap of love Inglorious laid; while mufic flows around, Perfumes, and oils, and wine, and wanton hours; 995 Amid the roses fierce Repentance rears
Her fnaky creft: a quick-returning pang
Shoots through the conscious heart; where honour ftill, And great defign, against the oppreffive load
Of luxury, by fits, impatient heave.
But abfent, what fantastic woes arous'd,
Rage in each thought, by reftlefs mufing fed,
Chill the warm cheek, and blaft the bloom of life?
Neglected fortune flies; and fliding swift,
Prone into ruin, fall his fcorn'd affairs.
'Tis nought but gloom around: the darken'd fun
Lofes his light. The rofy-bofom'd Spring
To weeping Fancy pines; and yon bright arch,
Contracted, bends into a dusky vault.
All Nature fades extinct; and she alone
Heard, felt, and feen, poffeffes every thought,
Fills every fenfe, and pants in every vein.
Books are but formal dulnefs, tedious friends;
And fad amid the focial band he fits,
Lonely, and unattentive. From his tongue
Th' unfinish'd period falls: while, borne away
On fwelling thought, his wafted fpirit flies
To the vain bofom of his diftant fair;
And leaves the femblance of a lover, fix'd
In melancholy fite, with head declin'd,
And love-dejected eyes. Sudden he starts,
Shook from his tender trance, and reftlefs runs
To glimmering fhades, and fympathetic glooms;
Where the dun umbrage o'er the falling stream,
Romantic, hangs; there through the pensive dusk
Strays, in heart-thrilling meditation loft,
Indulging all to love: or on the bank
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