My clust'ring grape compens❜d their magic skill, Spontaneous gurgling from the mountain's side. But, ah! these youthful sportive hours are fled; These scenes of jocund mirth are now no more; No healing slumbers 'tend my humble bed, No friends condole the sorrows of the poor. And o'er the daisy hangs the humming bee. No more the warblers hail the infant day. To the lone corner of some distant shore, In dreary devious pilgrimage I'll fly, Shall trace my footsteps with a mortal eye. There solitary saunter o'er the beach, And to the murm'ring surge my griefs disclose; There shall my voice in plaintive wailings teach. The hollow caverns to resound my woes. Sweet are the waters to the parched tongue; Sweet are the blossoms to the wanton bee; Sweet to the shepherd sounds the lark's shrill song; But sweeter far is SOLITUDE to me. Adieu! ye fields, where I have fondly stray'd, Ye swains, who once the fav'rite DAMON knew! Farewel, ye sharers of my bounty's aid! Ye sons of base Ingratitude, adieu! AGAINST REPINING AT FORTUNE. THO' in my narrow bounds of rural toil, Yet all the gorgeous vanity of state I can contemplate with a cool disdain; With all the glories of the pencil hung, If Truth, fair Truth! within th 'unhallow'd walls, Hath never whisper'd with her seraph tongue? Avails it aught, if music's gentle lay Hath oft been echo'd by the sounding dome; If music cannot soothe their griefs away, Or change a wretched to a happy home? Tho' Fortune should invest them with her spoils, Enlarge their confines, and decrease their toils, Tho' fickle she disclaim my moss-grown cot, I'll neither fear her fall, nor court her rise. When early darks shall cease the matin song? When Philomel at night resigns her lay; When melting numbers to the owl belong, Then shall the reed be silent in thy praise. Can he, who with the tide of Fortune sails, More pleasure from the sweets of Nature share? Do zephyrs waft him more ambrosial gales, Or do his groves a gayer liv'ry wear? To me the heav'ns unveil as pure a sky; To me the flow'rs as rich a bloom disclose; If Luxury their lavish dainties piles, And still attends upon their fated hours, Doth Health reward them with her open smiles, Or Exercise enlarge their feeble pow'rs? 'Tis not in richest mines of Indian gold, That man this jewel happiness can find, If his unfeeling breast to virtue cold, Denies her entrance to his ruthless mind. Wealth, pomp and honour are but gaudy toyss B CONSCIENCE: AN ELEGY, -Leave her to Heav'n, And to the thorns that in her bosom lodge, To prick and fting her. SHAKES. No choiring warblers flutter in the sky, O happy he, whose conscience knows no guile! His soul shall wing, on pleasing fancies borne, To shining vales where flow'rets lift their head, Wak'd by the breathing zephyrs of the morn. But wretched he whose foul reproachful deeds Can thro' an angry conscience wound his rest; His eye too oft the balmy comfort needs, Tho' Slumber seldom knows him as her guest. To calm the raging tumults of his soul, If wearied Nature should an hour demand, Around his bed the sheeted spectres howl, Red with revenge the grinning furies stand. Nor state nor grandeur can his pain allay; Where shall he find a requiem to his woes? Pow'r cannot chace the frightful gloom away, Nor music lull him to a kind repose. Where is the king that Conscience fears to chide? DAMON TO HIS FRIENDS. THE billows of life are supprest, Dame Fortune and I are agreed; For the goddess has kindly decreed, That Damon no more shall be poor. Now riches will ope the dim eyes, To view the increase of my store; That could look on misfortune awry! To despise the few friends that were kind. For theirs was a feeling sincere, |