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Or pierce the broken foe's remotest lines,
The hardy veteran with tears resigns.

Unfortunate Tallard! Oh, who can name
The pangs of rage, of sorrow and of shame,
That with mix'd tunnit in thy bosom swell'd,But soon as the victorious host he spies,

When first thou saw'st thy bravest troops re-
pell'd,

Thine only son pierc'd with a deadly wound,
Chok'd in his blood, and gasping on the ground;
Thyself in bondage by the victor kept!
The chief, the father, and the captive wept.
An English Muse is touch'd with generous woe,
And in th' unhappy man forgets the foe!
Greatly distress'd, thy loud complaints forbear,
Blame not the turns of fate, and chance of war;
Give thy brave foes their due, nor blush to own
The fatal field by such great leaders won,
The field whence fam'd Eugenio bore away
Only the second honors of the day.

No toils are painful that can danger show,
No climes unlovely that contain a foe.
The rovingGaul, to his own bounds restrain'd,
Learns to encamp within his native land:
From hill to hill, from stream to stream he flies,
Such dire impressions in his heart remain
Of Marlborough's sword, and Hochstet's fatal
plain:

In vain Britannia's mighty chief besets
Their shady coverts and obscure retreats;
They fly the conqueror's approaching fame,
That bears the force of armies in his name.
Austria's young monarch, whose imperial sway
Sceptres and thrones are destin'd to obey,
Whose boasted ancestry so high extends
That in the Pagan gods his lineage ends,
Comes from afar, in gratitude to own
[fell,The great supporter of his father's throne :
What tides of glory to his bosom ran,
Clasp'd in the embraces of the godlike man!
How were his eyes with pleasing wonder fix'd
To see such fire with so much sweetness mix'd,
Such easy greatness, such a graceful port,
So turn'd and finish'd for the camp or court!

With floods of gore that from the vanquish'd
The marshes stagnate, and the rivers swell.
Mountains of slain lie heap'd upon the ground,
Or 'midst the roarings of the Danube drown'd;
Whole captive hosts the conqueror detains
In painful bondage and inglorious chains;
Ev'n those who 'scape the fetters and the sword,
Nor seek the fortunes of a happier lord,
Their raging King dishonors, to complete
Marlborough's great work, and finish the defeat.
From Memminghen's high domes, and Aug-
sburg's walls,

The distant battle drives th' insulting Gauls;
Freed by the terror of the victor's name,
The rescued states his great protection élaim;
Whilst Ulm th' approach of her deliverer waits,
And longs to open her obsequious gates.

The hero's breast still swells with great designs,
In ev'ry thought the tow'ring genius shines:
If to the foe his dreadful course he bends
O'er the wide continent his march extends;
If sieges in his lab'ring thoughts are form'd,
Camps are assaulted, and an army storm'd;
If to the fight his active soul is bent,
The fate of Europe turns on its event.
What distant land, what region, can afford
An action worthy his victorious sword?
Where will he next the flying Gaul defeat,
To make the series of his toils complete?
Where the swoln Rhine rushing with all its
Divides the hostile nations in its course, [force
While cach contracts its bounds, or wider grows,
Enlarg'd or straighten'd as the river flows,
On Gallia's side a mighty bulwark stands,
The all the wide extended plain commands;
Twice, since the war was kindled, has it tried
The victor's rage, and twice has chang'd its side;
As of whele armies, with the prize o'erjoy'd,
Have long summer on its walls employ'd.
Hither our mighty chief his arms directs,
Fience future triumphs from the war expects;
A though he deg-star had its course begun,
Cares his arms still nearer to the sun :
Fidm the glorious action he forgets
The change of seasons, and increase of heats;

Achilles was thus form'd with ev'ry grace,
And Nireus shone but in the second place;
Thus the great father of Almighty Rome
Divinely flush'd with an immortal bloom
That Cytherea's fragrant breath bestow'd)
In all the charms of his bright mother glow'd.
The royal youth, by Marlborough's presence

charm'd,

Taught by his counsels, by his actions warm'd,
On Landau with redoubled fury falls,
Discharges all his thunder on his walls;
O'er mines and caves of death provokes the fight,
And learns to conquer in the hero's sight.

The British chief for mighty toils renown'd,
Increas'd in titles, and with conquests crown'd,
To Belgian coasts his tedious march renews,
And the long windings of the Rhine pursues,
Clearing its borders from usurping foes,
And blest by rescued nations as he goes.
Treves fears no more, freed from its dire alarms;
And Traerbach feels the terror of his arms:
Seated on rocks her proud foundations shake,
While Marlborough presses to the bold attack,
Plants all his batt'ries, bids his cannon roar,
And shows how Landau might have fall'n before.
Scar'd at his near approach, great Louis fears
Vengeance reserv'd for his declining years,
Forgets his thirst of universal sway,
And scarce can teach his subjects to obey;
His arms he finds on vain attempts employ'd,
Th' ambitious projects for his race destroy'd,
The works of ages sunk in one campaign,
And lives of millions sacrific'd in vain.

Such are th' effects of Anna's royal cares;
By her, Britannia, great in foreign wars,
Ranges thro' nations, whereso'er disjoin'd,
Without the wonted aid of sea and wind
By her th' unfetter'd Ister's states are free,
And taste the sweets of English liberty:

But

But who can tell the joys of those that lie
Beneath the constant influence of her eye!
Whilst in diffusive show'rs her bounties fall
Like Heaven's indulgence, and descend on all,
Secure the happy, succour the distress'd,
Make ev'ry subject glad, and a whole people blest.
Thus would I fain Britannia's wars rehearse,
In the smooth records of a faithful verse;
That, if such numbers can o'er time prevail,
May tell posterity the wond'rous tale.
When actions, unadorn'd, are faint and weak,
Cities and countries must be taught to speak;
Gods may descend in fictions from the skies,
And rivers from their oozy beds arise;
Fiction may deck the truth with spurious rays,
And round the hero cast a borrow'd blaze :
Marlborough's exploits appear divinely bright,
And proudly shine in their own native light;
Rais'd of themselves, their genuine charms they
[most.

boast;

And those who paint them truest, praise them

§ 41. An Allegory on Man. Parnell.
A THOUGHTFUL being, long and spare,
Our race of mortals call him Care,
(Were Homer living, well he knew
What name the gods have call'd him too);
With fine mechanic genius wrought,
And lov'd to work, though no one bought.
This being, by a model bred
In Jove's eternal sable head,
Contriv'd a shape empower'd to breathe,
And be the worldling here beneath.

The man rose staring, like a stake,
Wond'ring to see himself awake!
Then look'd so wise, before he knew
The business he was made to do,
That, pleas'd to see with what a grace
He gravely show'd his forward face,
Jove talk'd of breeding him an high,
An under-something of the sky.

But ere he gave the mighty nod,
Which ever binds a poet's god
(For which his curls ambrosial shake,
And mother Earth's obliged to quake),
He saw his mother Earth arise;
She stood confess'd before his eyes;
But not with what we read she wore;
A castle for a crown before;
Nor with long streets and longer roads
Dangling behind her, like commodes:
As yet with wreaths along she dress'd,
And trail'd a landscape-painted vest.
Then thrice she rais'd, as Ovid said,
And thrice she bow'd her weighty head.

Her honors made-Great Jove she cried,
This thing was fashion'd from my side:
His hands, his heart, his head are mine;
Then what hast thou to call him thine?

Nay, rather ask, the Monarch said,
What boots his hand, his heart, his head,
Were what I gave remov'd away?
Thy part's an idle shape of clay.

Halves, more than halves! cried honest Care,
Your pleas would make your titles fair;
You claim the body, you the soul,
But I, who join'd them, claim the whole.
Thus with the gods debate began,
On such a trivial cause as man.
And can celestial tempers rage?
Quoth Virgil, in a later age.

As thus they wrangled, Time came by
(There's none that paint him such as I:
For what the fabling antients sung
Makes Saturn old when Time was young):
As vet his winters had not shed
Their silver honors on his head;
He just had got his pinions free
From his old sire, Eternity.
A serpent girdled round he wore,
The tail within the mouth before;
By which our almanacs are clear
That learned Egypt meant the year.
A staff he carried, where on high
A glass was fix'd to measure by,
As amber boxes made a show
For heads of canes an age ago.
His vest, for day and night, was pied;
A bending sickle arm'd his side;
And Spring's new months his trade adorn
The other Seasons were unborn.

Known by the gods, as near he draws,
They make him umpire of the cause.
O'er a low trunk his arm he laid,
Where since his hours a dial made;
Then, leaning, heard the nice debate,
And thus pronounc'd the words of Fate:

Since body, from the parent Earth,
And soul from Jove receiv'd a birth,
Return they where they first began;
But, since their union makes the man,
Till Jove and Earth shall put these two,
To Care, who join'd them, man is due.

He said, and sprung with swift career
To trace a circle for the year;
Where ever since the Seasons wheel,
And tread on one another's heel.
'Tis well, said Jove; and, for consent,
Thund'ring he shook the firmament.
Our umpire Time shall have his way;
With Care I let the creature stay:
Let bus'ness vex him, av'rice blind,
Let doubt and knowledge rack his mind,
Let error act, opinion speak,
And want affliot, and sickness break,
And anger burn, dejection chill,
And joy distract, and sorrow kill;
Till, arm'd by Care, and taught to mow,
Time draws the long distracted blow ;
And wasted man, whose quick decay
Comes hurrying on before his day,
Shall only find by this decree,
The soul flies sooner back to me.

$42. The Book-Worm. Parnell. COME hither, boy, we 'll hunt to-day The Book-worm, rav'ning beast of prey! A a 4 Produc'd

Produc'd by parent Earth, at odds,
As Fame reports it, with the gods.
Him frantic hunger wildly drives
Against a thousand author's lives :
Through all the fields of wit he flies;
Dreadful his wit with clust'ring eyes,
With horns without, and tusks within,
And scales to serve him for a skin.
Observe him nearly, lest he climb
To wound the bards of antient time,
Or down the vale of Fancy go,
To tear some modern wreich below.
On ev'ry corner fix thine eye,
Or ten to one he slips thee by.
See where his tecth a passage eat:
We'll rouse him from the deep retreat.
But who the shelter 's forc'd to give?
"Tis sacred Virgil, as I live;

From leaf to leaf, from song to song,
He draws the tadpole form along;
He mounts the gilded edge before;
He's up, he scuds the cover o'er;
He turns, he doubles, there he
pass'd;
And here we have him, caught at last,
Insatiate brute, whose teeth abuse
The sweetest servants of the Musc!
(Nay, never offer to deny,

I took thee in the fact to fly.)
His roses nipt in ev'ry page,
My

poor Anacreon mourns thy rage;
By thee my Ovid wounded lies;
By thee my Lesbia's sparrow dies;
Thy rabid teeth have half destroy'd
The work of love in Biddy Floyd;
They rent Belinda's locks away,
And spoil'd the Blouzelind of Gay,
For all, for ev'ry single deed,
Relentless justice bids the bleed.
Then fall a victim to the Nine,
Myself the priest, my desk the shrine.
Bring Homer, Virgil, Tasso near,
To pile a sacred altar here:
Hold, boy, thy hand outruns thy wit,
You've reach'd the plays that Dennis writ:
You've reach'd me Philips' rustic strain ;
Pray take your mortal Bards again.

Come, bind the victim-there he lies,
And here between his num'rous eyes
This venerable dust I lay,
From manuscripts just swept away.
The goblet in my hand I take
(For the libation 's yet to make)
A health to poets all their days,
May they have bread, as well as praise;
Sense may they seek, and less engage
fill'd with party rage:
papers
But, if their riches spoil their vein,
Ye Musts, make them poor again.

In

Now bring the weapon, yonder blade, With which my tuneful pens are made.

I strike the scales that arm thec round,
And twice and thrice I print the wound;
The sacred altar floats with red,
And now he dies, and now he's dead.

How like the son of Jove I stand,
This Hydra stretch'd bencath my hand!
Lay bare the monster's entrails here,
To see what dangers threat the year:
Ye gods! what sonnets on a wench!
What lean translations out of French!
"Tis plain this lobe is so unsound,
S-

-

prints before the months go round But hold before I close the scene, The sacred altar should be clean. Oh had I Shadwell's second bays, Or, Tate, thy pert and humble lays! (Ye pair, forgive me, when I vow I never miss'd your works till now) I'd tear the leaves to wipe the shrine (That only way you please the Nine;) But since I chance to want these two, I'll make the songs of Durfey do.

Rent from the corpse, on yonder pin
I hang the scales that brac'd it in;
I hang my studious morning gown,
And write my own inscription down:

"This trophy from the Python won, "This robe in which the deed was done, "These, Parnell, glorying in the feat,

66

Hung on these shelves, the Muses' seat. "Here ignorance and hunger found

66

Large realms of wit to ravage round: "Here ignorance and hunger fell, "Two foes in one I sent to hell. "Ye poets, who labors my "Come share the triumph all with me! "Ye critics! born to vex the Muse, "To mourn the grand ally you lose.”

see,

$ 43. Ad Amicos. R. West. Yes, happy youths, on Camus' sedgy side, You feel each joy that friendship can divide; Each realm of science and of art explore, And with the antient blend the modern lore. Studious alone to learn whate'er may tend To raise the genius, or the heart to mend; Now pleas'd along the cloister'd walk you rove, And trace the verdant mazes of the grove, Where social oft, and oft alone, you choose To catch the zephyr, and to court the Muse. Meantime at me (while all devoid of art These lines give back the image of my heart)— At me the pow'r, that comes or soon or late, Or aims, or seems to aim, the dart of fate; From you, remote, methinks, alone I stand, Like some sad exile in a desart land: Around no friends their lenient care to join Inmutual warmth, andmix their heart with mine, Or real pains, or those which fancy raise, For ever blot the sunshine of my days;

Almost all Tibullus's Elegy is imitated in this little Picce, from whence his transition to Mr. Pope's letter is very artfully contrived, and bespeaks a degree of judgement much beyond Mr.West's years.

Το

To sickness still, and still to grief a prey,
Health turns from me her rosy face away.

Just Heav'n! what sin,ere life begins to bloom,
Devotes my head untimely to the tomb?
Did ere this hand against a brother's life
Drug the dire bowl, or point the murd'rous knife?
Did e'er this tongue the slanderer's tale pro-
claim,

Or madly violate my Maker's name?
Did e'er this heart betray a friend or foe,
Or know a thought but all the world might know?
As yet, just started from the lists of time,
My growing years have scarcely told their prime;
Useless, as yet, thro' life I've idly run,
No pleasures tasted, and few duties done.
Ah who, ere autumn's mellowing suns appear,
Would pluck the promise of the vernal year ;
Or, ere the grapes their purple hue betray,
Tear the crude cluster from the morning spray?
Stern power of Fate, whose ebon sceptre
rules
The Stygian desarts and Cimmerian pools,
Forbear, nor rashly smite my youthful heart,
A victim yet unworthy of thy dart;
Ah, stay till age shall blast my withering face,
Shake in my head, and falter in my pace;
Then aim the shaft, then meditate the blow,
And to the dead my willing shade shall go.
How weak is Man to Reason's judging eye!
Born in this moment, in the next we die;
Part mortal clay, and part ethereal fire,
Too proud to creep, too humble to aspire,
In vain our plans of happiness we raise,
Pain is our lot, and patience is our praise;
Wealth, lineage, honors, conquest, or a throne,
Are what the wise would fear to call their own.
Health is at best a vain precarious thing,
And fair-fac'd youth is ever on the wing;
'Tis like the stream beside whose wat'ry bed
Sone blooming plant exalts his flow'ry head;
Nurs'd by the wave the spreading branches rise,
Shade all the ground, and flourish to the skies;
The waves the while beneath in secret dow,
A.al undermine the hollow bank below:
Wide and more wide the waters urge their way,
Bare all the roots, and on their fibres prey;
Too late the plant bewails his foolish pride,
And sinks, untimely, in the whelming tide.
But why repine? Does life deserve my sigh?
Few will lament my loss whene'er I die.
For those, the wretches I despise or hate,
I neither envy nor regard their fate.
For me, whene'er all-conqu'ring Death shall
spread

His wings around my unrepining head,
I care not: tho' this face be seen no more,
The world will pass as cheerful as before;
Bright as before the day-star will appear,
The fields as verdant, and the skies as clear;
Nor storms nor comets will my doon declare,
Nor signs on earth, nor portents in the air;
Unknown and silent will depart my breath,
Nor nature e'er take notice of any death.
Yet some there are (ere spent my vital days)
Within whose breasts my tomb I wish to raise.

Lov'd in my life, lamented in my end, Their praise would crown me, as their precepts mend:

To them may these fond lines my name endear; Not from the poet, but the friend sincere.

§ 44. An Address to Winter. Cowper. OH Winter! ruler of th' inverted year, Thy scatter'd hair with sleet like ashes fill'd, Thy breath congeal'd upon thy lips, thy checks Fring'd with a beard made white with other

snows

Than those of age; thy forehead wrapt in clouds;
A leafless branch thy sceptre; and thy throne
A sliding car indebted to no wheels,
But urg'd by storms along its slippery way;
I love thee, all unlovely as thou seem'st,
And dreaded as thou art. Thon hold'st the sun
A pris'ner in the yet undawning east,
Short ning his journey between morn and noon,
And hurrying him, impatient of his stay,
Down to the rosy west: But kindly still
Compensating his loss with added hours
Of social converse and instructive ease,
And gathering at short notice in one group
The family dispers'd, and fixing thought,
Not less dispers'd by day-light and its cares.
I crown thee king of intimate delights,
Fire-side enjoyments, home-born happiness,
And all the comforts that the lowly roof
Of undisturb'd retirement, and the hours
Of long uninterrupted evening know.
No rattling wheels stop short before these gates;
No powder'd pert, proficient in the art
Of sounding an alarm, assaults these doors
Till the street rings. No stationary steeds,
Cough their own knell, while heedless of the

sound

The silent circle fan themselves, and quake;
But here the needle plies its busy task,
The pattern grows, the well-depicted flow'r
Wrought patiently into the snowy lawn
Unfolds its bosom, buds, and leaves, and sprigs,
And curling tendrils, gracefully dispos'd,
Follow the nimble finger of the fair,

A wreath that cannot fade, of flowers that blow
With most success when all besides decay.
The poet's or historian's page, by one
Made vocal for th' amusement of the rest:
The sprightly lyre, whose treasure of sweet sounds
The touch from many a trembling chord shakes
out;

And the clear voice symphonious, yet distinct,
And in the charming strife triumphant still,
Beguile the night, and set a keener edge
On female industry; the threaded steel
Flies swiftly, and unfelt the task proceeds.
The little volume clos'd, the customary rites
Of the last meal commence. A Roman meal,
Such as the mistress of the world once found
Delicious, when her patriots of high note,
Perhaps by moon-light, at their humble doors,
And under an old oak's domestic shade,
Enjoy'd

Enjoy'd, spare feast, a radish and an egg.
Discourse ensues, not trivial, yet not dull,
Nor such as with a frown forbids the play
Of fancy, or prescribes the sound of mirth.
Nor do we madly, like an impious world,
Who deem religion phirenzy, and the God
That made them an intruder on their joys,
Start at his awful name, or deem his praise
A jarring note. Themes of a graver tone
Exciting oft our gratitude and love,
While we retrace with memory's pointing
wand,

That calls the past to our exact review,
The dangers we have 'scap'd, the broken snare,
The disappointed foe, deliv`rance found
Unlook'd for, life preserv'd and peace restor'd,
Fruits of omnipotent eternal love.
Oh evenings worthy of the gods! exclaim'd
The Sabine bard. Oh, evenings! I reply,
More to be priz'd and coveted than yours,
As more illumin'd and with nobler truths,
That I, and Mine, and those we love, enjoy.

$45. Liberty renders England preferable to other Nations, notwithstanding Taxes, &c.

Cowper.

"Trs Liberty alone that gives the flow'r
Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume,
And we are weeds without it. All constraint,
Except what wisdom lays on evil men,
Is evil, hurts the faculties, impedes
Their progress in the road of science; blinds
The eye-sight of discovery, and begets
In those that suffer it a sordid mind
Bestial, a meagre intellect, unfit
To be the tenant of man's noble form.
Thee therefore, still, blame-worthy as thou art,
With all thy loss of empire, and though squeez'd
By public exigence till annual food
Fails for the craving hunger of the state,
Thee I account still happy, and the chief
Among the nations, seeing thou art free!
My native nook of earth! thy clime is rude,
Replete with vapors, and disposes much
All hearts to sadness, and none more than mine;
Thine unadult'rate manners are less soft
And plausible than social life requires,
And thou hast need of discipline and art
To give thee what politer France receives
From Nature's bounty that humane address
And sweetness, without which no pleasure is
In converse, either starv'd by cold reserve,
Or flush'd with fierce dispute, a senseless brawl;
Yet, being free, I love thee: For the sake
Of that one feature, can be well content,
Disgrac'd as thou hast been, poor as thou art,
To seek no sublunary rest beside,

But, once enslav'd, farewell! I could endure
Chains no where patiently; and chains at home,
Where I am free by birthright, not at all.
Then what were left of roughness in the grain
Of British natures, wanting its excuse

That it belongs to freemen, would disgust
And shock me. I should then with double
pain

Feel all the rigor of thy fickle clime;
And if I must bewail the blessing lost
For which our Hampdens and our Sidneys
bled,

I would at least bewail it under skies
Milder, among a people less austere,
In scenes which having never known me free,
Would not reproach me with the loss 1 felt.

§ 46. Description of a Poet. Cowper.
I KNOW the mind that feels indeed the fire
The Muse imparts, and can command the lyre,
Acts with a force and kindles with a zeal,
Whate'er the theme, that others never feel.
If human woes her soft attention claim,
A tender sympathy pervades the frame;
She pours a sensibility divine

Along the nerve of ev'ry feeling line.
But if a deed not tamely to be borne
Fire indignation, and a sense of scorn,
The strings are swept with such a pow'r, so
loud,

The storm of music shakes the astonish'd crowd.

So when remote futurity is brought
Before the keen inquiry of her thought,
A terrible sagacity informs

The poet's heart, he looks to distant storms,
He hears the thunder ere the tempest low'rs,
And, arm'd with strength surpassing human
pow'rs,

Seises events as yet unknown to man,
And darts his soul into the dawning plan.
Hence, in a Roman mouth, the graceful name
of Prophet and of Poet was the same;
Hence British poets too the priesthood shar‍d,
Aud ev'ry hallow'd Druid was a bard.

§ 47. Love Elegics. By

ELEGY I.

Tis night, dead night; and o'er the plain
Darkness extends her ebon ray,
While wide along the gloomy scene

Deep silence holds her solemu sway.
Throughout the earth no cheerful beam

The inelancholic eye surveys,
Save where the worm's fantastic gleam
The 'nighted traveller betrays.
The savage race (so heaven decrees)

No longer through the forest rove;
All nature rests, and not a breeze

Disturbs the stillness of the grove. All nature rests; in Sleep's soft arms

The village swain forgets his care: Sleep, that the stings of sorrow charms, And heals all sadness but despair.

Despair

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