24

HY M
M N.

FROM THOMSON'S SEASONS.

THESE, as they change, Almighty Father! these
Are but the varied God. The rolling year
Is full of Thee. Forth in the pleasing spring
Thy beauty walks, Thy tenderness and love.
Wide flush the fields; the foftning air is balm;
Echo the mountains round; the forest smiles;
And every sense, and every heart is joy.
Then comes Thy glory in the Summer months,
With light and heat refulgent. Then Thy fun
Shoots full perfection through the fwelling year;
And oft' Thy voice in dreadful thunder fpeaks;
And oft' at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve,
By brooks and groves, in hollow-whispering gales.
Thy bounty fhines in Autumn unconfin'd,

And spreads a common feaft for all that lives.

In Winter awful Thou! with clouds and storms

Around Thee thrown! tempeft o'er tempeft roll'd! Majestic darkness! on the whirlwind's wing,

Riding fublime, Thou bidft the world adore,

And humbleft nature with thy northern blast.

Mysterious round! what skill, what force divine,

Deep felt, in these appear! a fimple train,

Yet fo delightful mix'd, with fuch kind art,

Such beauty and beneficence combin'd,
Shade, unperceiv'd, fo foft'ning into shade,
And all fo forming an harmonious whale,
That as they still fucceed they ravish still.
But wandering oft', with brute-unconfcious gaze,
Man marks not Thee, marks not the mighty hand
That, ever busy, wheels the filent spheres,
Works in the fecret deep, fhoots, ftreaming thence
The fair profufion that o'erspreads the Spring!
Flings from the fun direct the flaming day,
Feeds every creature, hurls the tempeft forth;
And, as on earth this grateful change revolves,
With transport touches all the springs of life.
Nature, attend! join every living foul
Beneath the spacious temple of the sky,
In adoration join, and, ardent, raise

One general fong! to Him, ye vocal Gales!
Breathe foft, whofe Spirit in your freshness breathes;
Oh talk of Him in folitary glooms!

Where, o'er the rock, the scarcely-waving pine
Fills the brown fhade with a religious awe.

And ye! whofe bolder note is heard afar,

Who shake th' astonish'd world, lift high to Heaven
Th' impetuous fong, and fay from whom you rage.
His praife, ye Brooks! attune ye trembling Rills!
And let me catch it as I mufe along.

Ye headlong Torrents! rapid and profound;
Ye fofter Floods! that lead the humid maze

Along the vale; and thou, majestic Main!
A fecret world of wonders in thyself,

Sound His ftupendous praife, whofe greater voice
Or bids you roar, or bids your roarings fall.

Soft roll your incenfe, Herbs, and Fruits, and Flowers,
In mingled clouds, to Him, whofe fun exalts,
Whose breath perfumes you, and whofe pencil paints.
Ye Forefts! bend; ye Harvests! wave to Him;
Breathe your still song into the reaper's heart,
As home he goes beneath the joyous moon.
Ye that keep watch in heaven! as earth asleep
Unconscious lies, effufe your mildest beams,
Ye Conftellations! while your angels strike,
Amid the fpangled sky, the silver lyre.
Great Source of day, best image here below
Of thy Creator, ever pouring wide,

From world to world, the vital ocean round,
On Nature write, with every beam, his praise.
The thunder rolls: be hufh'd the proftrate World,
While cloud to cloud returns the folemn hymn.
Bleat out afresh, ye Hills! ye moffy Rocks!
Retain the found: the broad responsive low,
Ye Vallies! raise, for the Great Shepherd reigns,
And his unfuffering kingdom yet will come.
Ye Woodlands all! awake; a boundless fong
Burft from the Groves; and when the restless day,
Expiring, lays the warbling world asleep,

Sweeteft of birds! fweet Philomela! charm

i

The listening shades, and teach the Night his praife.
Ye, chief, for whom the whole creation fmiles,

At once the head, the heart, and tongue of all,
Crown the great hymn! in swarming cities vaft,
Affembled Men! to the deep organ join
The long-refounding voice, oft' breaking clear,
At folemn pauses, through the fwelling base,
And as each mingling flame increases each,
In one united ardour rife to heaven.
Or if you rather chufe the rural shade,
And find a fane in every facred grove;
There let the fhepherd's flute, the virgin's lay,
The prompting feraph, and the poet's lyre,
Still fing the God of Seafons as they roll.
For me, when I forget the darling theme,
Whether the bloffom blows, the fummer ray
Ruffets the plain, infpiring Autumn gleams,
Or Winter rifes in the blackening East,
Be my tongue mute, my Fancy paint no more,
And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat!

Should Fate command me to the fartheft verge
Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes,
Rivers unknown to fong, where first the fun
Gilds Indian mountains, or his fetting beam
Flames on the Atlantic ifles, 'tis nought to me;
Since God is ever present, ever felt,

In the void waste as in the city full!

And where He vital breathes there must be joy.

When even at laft the folemn hour shall come,
And wing my mystic flight to future worlds,
1 cheerful will obey; there with new powers
Will rifing wonders fing. I cannot go
Where Univerfal Love not fmiles around,
Sustaining all yon' orbs, and all their funs,
From feeming evil ftill educing good,
And better thence again, and better ftill,
In infinite progreffion. But I lofe

My felf in Him, in Light Ineffable;

Come then, expreffive Silence! muse his praise

EDWIN AND EMMA.

BY DAVID MALLET, ESQ.

Mark it, Cefario, it is true and plain.

The fpinfters and the knitters in the fun,

And the free maids that weave their thread with bones,

Do ufe to chant it. It is filly Sooth,

And dallies with the innocence of love,

Like the old age.

Shakespeare's Twelfth Night.

I.

FAR in the windings of a vale,

Faft by a sheltering wood,

The fafe retreat of health and peace,

An humble cottage stood.