The various Ills of Life.

Of their own limbs. How many drink the cup

Of baleful grief, or eat the bitter bread Of misery. Sore pierc'd by wintry winds, shrink into the sordid hut

How

many

Of cheerless poverty. How many shake

335

With all the fiercer tortures of the mind,

Unbounded passion, madness, guilt, remorse;

340

Whence tumbled headlong from the height of life,

They furnish matter for the tragic Muse.

Ev'n in the vale where wisdom loves to dwell,

345

With friendship, peace, and contemplation join'd,
How many, rack'd with honest passions, droop
In deep retir'd distress. How many stand
Around the death-bed of their dearest friends,
And point the parting anguish. Thought fond Man
Of these, and all the thousand nameless ills,
That one incessant struggle render life,
One scene of toil, of suffering, and of fate;
Vice in his high career would stand appall'd,
And heedless rambling Impulse learn to think;
The conscious heart of Charity would warm,
And her wide wish Benevolence dilate;

350

Miseries of a Prison.

The social tear would rise, the social sigh;
And into clear perfection, gradual bliss,
Refining still, the social passions work.

And here can I forget the generous band,

Who, touch'd with human woe, redressive search'd
Into the horrors of the gloomy jail?

Unpitied, and unheard, where misery moans

Where sickness pines; where thirst and hunger burn,

And poor misfortune feels the lash of vice.

While in the land of liberty, the land

Whose every street and public meeting glow

With open freedom, little tyrants rag'd;

365

Snatch'd the lean morsel from the starving mouth;
Tore from cold wintry limbs the tatter'd weed;
Ev'n robb'd them of the last of comforts, sleep; 370

The free-born BRITON to the dungeon chain'd,

Or, as the lust of cruelty prevail'd,

At pleasure mark'd him with inglorious stripes;

And crush'd out lives, by secret barbarous ways,

That for their country would have toil'd, or bled. 375

O great design! if executed well,

With patient care, and wisdom-temper'd zeal.

Ye sons of mercy! yet resume the search;

Wolves descending from

Drag forth the legal monsters into light,
Wrench from their hands oppression's iron rod,
And bid the cruel feel the pains they give.

Much still untouch'd remains; in this rank age,
Much is the patriot's weeding hand requir'd.

The toils of law, (what dark insidious Men
Have cumbrous added to perplex the truth,
And lengthen simple justice into trade)
How glorious were the day! that saw these broke,
And
every Man within the reach of right.

By wintry famine rous'd, from all the tract
Of horrid mountains which the shining Alps,

380

385

390

And wavy Appenine, and Pyrenees,

Branch out stupendous into distant lands;
Cruel as death, and hungry as the grave!

Burning for blood! bony, and gaunt, and grim!
Assembling wolves in raging troops descend;

395

And, pouring o'er the country, bear along,
Keen as the north-wind sweeps the glossy snow.
All is their prize. They fasten on the steed,
Press him to earth, and pierce his mighty heart.

Nor can the bull his awful front defend,

Or shake the murdering savages away.

400

The Alps and Appenines.

Rapacious, at the mother's throat they fly,
And tear the screaming infant from her breast.

The godlike face of Man avails him nought.
Ev'n beauty, force divine! at whose bright glance 405
The generous lion stands in softened gaze,
Here bleeds, a hapless undistinguish'd prey.
But if, appriz'd of the severe attack,

The country be shut up; lur'd by the scent,
On church-yards drear (inhuman to relate!)

410

The disappointed prowlers fall, and dig

The shrouded body from the grave; o'er which,

Mix'd with foul shades, and frighted ghosts, they howl.

Among those hilly regions, where embrac'd

In peaceful vales the happy Grisons dwell;

Oft, rushing sudden from the loaded cliffs,

Mountains of snow their gathering terrors roll.

415

From steep to steep, loud-thundering down they come, A wintry waste in dire commotion all;

And herds, and flocks, and travellers, and swains, 420 And sometimes whole brigades of marching troops,

Or hainlets sleeping in the dead of night,

Are deep beneath the smothering ruin whelm'd.

Now, all amid the rigours of the year,

Converse with the Dead.

In the wild depth of Winter, while without
The ceaseless winds blow ice, be my retreat,
Between the groaning forest and the shore
Beat by the boundless multitude of waves,
A rural, shelter'd, solitary scene;
Where ruddy fire and beaming tapers join

425

430

To cheer the gloom. There studious let me sit,
And hold high converse with the MIGHTY DEAD;
Sages of ancient time, as gods rever'd;

As gods beneficent, who blest mankind
With arts, with arms, and humaniz'd a world.
Rous'd at th' inspiring thought, I throw aside
The long-liv'd volume; and, deep-musing, hail
The sacred shades, that slowly-rising pass
Before my wondering eyes. First SOCRATES,
Who, firmly good in a corrupted state,

435

440

Against the rage of tyrants single stood,

Invincible! calm Reason's holy law,

That Voice of GOD within th' attentive mind,

Obeying, fearless, or in life, or death.

Great moral teacher! wisest of Mankind!

445

SOLON the next; who built his common-weal

On equity's wide base; by tender laws