Lo, in the Vale of Years beneath

A grisly troop are seen,
The painful family of Death,

More hideous than their Queen:
This racks the joints, this fires the veins,
That every labouring sinew strains,

Those in the deeper vitals rage :
Lo, Poverty, to fill the band,
That numbs the soul with icy hand,

And slow-consuming Age.

To each his sufferings : all are men,

Condemn'd alike to groan ;
The tender for another's pain,

The' unfeeling for his own.
Yet ah! why should they know their fate,
Since Sorrow never comes too late,

And happiness too swiftly dies?
Thought would destroy their paradise.
No more ;-where ignorance is bliss,

'Tis folly to be wise.

TU ADVERSITY.

Ζηνα
Tov og overv Bporous odo-

σαντα, τω παθει μαθαν
Θεντα κυρίως εχειν.

ÆSCHYLUS, in Agamemnonc.

DAUGHTER of Jove, relentless power,

Thou tamer of the human breast, Whose iron scourge and torturing hour

The bad affright, afflict the best!

Bound in thy adamantine chain,
The proud are taught to taste of pain,

And purple tyrants vainly groan,
With pangs unfelt before, unpitied and alone.

When first thy sire to send on earth

Virtue, his darling child, design'd,
To thee he gave the heav'nly birth,

And bade to form her infant mind.
Stern rugged nurse! thy rigid lore
With patience many a year she bore:

What sorrow was, thou bad'st her know,
And from her own she learn’d to melt at others' woe.

Scard at thy frown terrific, fly

Self-pleasing Folly's idle brood,
Wild Laughter, Noise, and thoughtless Joy,

And leave us leisure to be good.
Light they disperse ; and with them go

The summer friend, the flattering foe;

By vain Prosperity receiv'd, To her they vow their truth, and are again believ'd.

Wisdom in sable garb array'd,

Immers'd in rapturous thought profound,
And Melancholy, silent maid,

With leaden eye that loves the ground,
Still on thy solemn steps attend :
Warm Charity, the general friend,

With Justice, to herself severe,
And Pity, dropping soft the sadly-pleasing tear.

Oh, gently on thy suppliant's head,
Dread Goddess, lay thy chast’ning hand!

Not in thy Gorgon terrors clad,

Not circled with the vengeful band (As by the impious thou art seen) With thundering voice, and threatening mien,

With screaming Horror's funeral cry,
Despair, and fell Disease, and ghastly Poverty:
Thy form benign, oh Goddess ! wear,

Thy milder influence impart,
Thy philosophic train be there

To soften, not to wound my heart. The generous spark extinct revive, Teach me to love, and to forgive,

Exact my own defects to scan, What others are to feel, and know myself a man.

TAE PROGRESS OF POESY.

A PINDAKIC ODE.

Φωγαντα συνετοισιν ες
A6 TO Ord sprentar
Χατιζα.

PINDAR, Olymp. II.

I. 1.
AWAKE, Æolian lyre, awake,*
And give to rapture all thy trembling strings.
From Helicon's harmonious springs

A thousand rills their mazy progress take: * Awake, my glory: awake, lute and harp -David's Psalms. Piudar styles his own poetry, with its musical accompaniments, Αιολις μολπη Αιολιδες χορδαι, Αιολιδων ονοαι, αυλων, Eolian song, Æolian strings, the breath of the Æolian flute.

The subject and simile, as usual with Pindar, are here united.

The laughing flowers, that round them blow,
Drink life and fragrance as they flow.
Now the rich stream of Music winds along,
Deep, majestic, smooth, and strong,
Through verdant vales, and Ceres' golden reign ;
Now rolling down the steep amain,
Headlong, impetuous, see it pour :

[roar. The rocks and nodding groves re-bellow to the

1. 2.

Oh! Sovereign of the willing soul,* Parent of sweet and solemn-breathing airs, Enchanting shell ! the sullen Cares

And frantic Passions hear thy soft control. On Thracia's hills the Lord of War Has curb'd the fury of his car, And drop'd his thirsty lance at thy command. Perching on the sceptred handt Of Jove, thy magic lulls the feather'd king With ruffled plumes and flagging wind : Quench'd in dark clouds of slumber lie The terror of his beak, and lightnings of his eye.

1. 3.
Thee, the voice, the dance, obey, *
Temper'd to thy warbled lay.
O'er Idalia's velvet-green
The rosy-crowned Loves are seen
On Cytherea's day
With antic Sport, and blue-ey'd Pleasures,
Frisking light in frolic measures;

Now pursuing, now retreating,

Now in circling troops they meet : To brisk notes in cadence beating,

Glance their many twinkling feet.f Slow melting strains theirQueen's approach declare:

Where'er she turns the Graces homage pay With arms sublime, that float upon the air,

In gliding state she wins her easy way : O'er her warm cheek, and rising bosom, move The bluom of young Desire and purple light of Love.

II. 1.

Man's feeble race what ills await! Labour, and Penury, the racks of Pain, Disease, and Sorrow's weeping train,

And Death, sad refuge from the storms of Fate !

• Power of harmony to produce all the graces of motion in the body. 1 Μαρμαρυγας θηιτο σοδων θαυμαζε δε θυμω.

Homer, Od.. + Δαμπα δ' επι πορφυρεησι

Παρησι φως ερωτG. Phrynicus apud Athenaeum.

To compensate the real or imaginary ills of life, the Muse was given us by the same Providence that sends the day, by its cheerful presence, to dispel the gloom and terrors of the night.