This day, whate'er the Fates decree,
Shall still be kept with joy by me.
This day then let us not be told
That you are sick, and I grown old;
Nor think on our approaching ills,
And talk of spectacles and pills.
To-morrow will be time enough
To hear such mortifying stuff.

Yet, since from reason may be brought
A better and more pleasing thought,
Which can in spite of all decays
Support a few remaining days,
From not the gravest of divines
Accept for once some serious lines.

Altho' we now can form no more
Long schemes of life, as heretofore;
Yet you, while time is running fast,
Can look with joy on what is past.
Were future happiness and pain
A mere contrivance of the brain,
As atheists argue, to entice
And fit their proselytes for vice,
(The only comfort they propose,
To have companions in their woes)
Grant this the case; yet sure 'tis hard
That virtue, styled its own reward

And by all sages understood

To be the chief of human good,
Should acting die, nor leave behind
Some lasting pleasure in the mind,
Which, by remembrance, will assuage
Grief, sickness, poverty, and age;
And strongly shoot a radiant dart
To shine thro' life's declining part.
Say, Stella, feel you no content,
Reflecting on a life well spent?
Your skilful hand employ'd to save
Despairing wretches from the grave;
And then supporting with your store

Those whom you dragg'd from death before.

ΤΟ

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An innocent and absent friend;

That courage which can make you just
To merit humbled in the dust;
The detestation you express

For vice in all its glittering dress;
That patience under torturing pain,
Where stubborn stoics would complain:
Must these like empty shadows pass,
Or forms reflected from a glass?
Or mere chimæras in the mind,
That fly and leave no marks behind?
Does not the body thrive and grow
By food of twenty years ago?
And, had it not been still supplied,
It must a thousand times have died.
Then who with reason can maintain
That no effects of food remain?
And is not virtue in mankind
The nutriment that feeds the mind;
Upheld by each good action past,
And still continued by the last?
Then, who with reason can pretend
That all effects of virtue end?
Believe me, Stella, when you show
That true contempt for things below,
Nor prize your life for other ends

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For virtue in her daily race,

Like Janus, bears a double face;

Looks back with joy where she has gone,
And therefore goes with courage on.
She at your sickly couch will wait,
And guide you to a better state.

O then, whatever Heaven intends,
Take pity on your pitying friends!
Nor let your ills affect your mind,
To fancy they can be unkind.
Me, surely me, you ought to spare,
Who gladly would your suffering share,
Or give my scrap of life to you,
And think it far beneath your due;
You, to whose care so oft I owe

That I'm alive to tell you so.

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But age has rusted what the poet writ,
Worn out his language, and obscured his wit;
In vain he jests in his unpolished strain,
And tries to make his readers laugh, in vain.
Old Spenser next, warmed with poetic rage,
In ancient tales amused a barbarous age;
An age that yet uncultivate and rude,
Where'er the poet's fancy led, pursued
Through pathless fields, and unfrequented floods,
To dens of dragons and enchanted woods.
But now the mystic tale, that pleased of yore,
Can charm an understanding age no more;
The long-spun allegories fulsome grow,
While the dull moral lies too plain below.
We view well-pleased at distance all the sights
Of arms and palfreys, battles, fields, and fights,
And damsels in distress, and courteous knights;
But when we look too near, the shades decay, 30
And all the pleasing landscape fades away.

Great Cowley then, a mighty genius, wrote,
O'er-run with wit, and lavish of his thought:
His turns too closely on the reader press;

He more had pleased us, had he pleased us less.

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One glittering thought no sooner strikes our eyes
With silent wonder, but new wonders rise;
As in the milky-way a shining white
O'er-flows the heavens with one continued light,
That not a single star can show his rays,
Whilst jointly all promote the common blaze.
Pardon, great poet, that I dare to name
The unnumbered beauties of thy verse with blame;
Thy fault is only wit in its excess,

But wit like thine in any shape will please.
What muse but thine can equal hints inspire,
And fit the deep-mouthed Pindar to thy lyre;
Pindar, whom others, in a laboured strain
And forced expression, imitate in vain?
Well-pleased in thee he soars with new delight, 50
And plays in more unbounded verse, and takes a
nobler flight.

Blest man! whose spotless life and charming lays

Employed the tuneful prelate in thy praise:
Blest man! who now shalt be forever known
In Sprat's successful labours and thy own.

And Poverty looks cheerful in thy sight;
Thou mak'st the gloomy face of nature gay, 249
Giv'st beauty to the sun, and pleasure to the
day.

Thee, goddess, thee, Britannia's isle adores;
How has she oft exhausted all her stores,
How oft in fields of death thy presence sought,
Nor thinks the mighty prize too dearly bought!
On foreign mountains may the sun refine
The grape's soft juice, and mellow it to wine;
With citron groves adorn a distant soil,
And the fat olive swell with floods of oil:
We envy not the warmer clime, that lies
In ten degrees of more indulgent skies,
Nor at the coarseness of our heaven repine,
Though o'er our heads the frozen Pleiads shine:
'Tis liberty that crowns Britannia's isle,
And makes her barren rocks and her bleak moun-
tains smile.

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Others with towering piles may please the sight, And in their proud, aspiring domes delight; A nicer touch to the stretched canvas give, Or teach their animated rocks to live: 'Tis Britain's care to watch o'er Europe's fate, And hold in balance each contending state, 270 To threaten bold, presumptuous kings with war, And answer her afflicted neighbours' prayer. The Dane and Swede, roused up by fierce alarms, Bless the wise conduct of her pious arms: Soon as her fleets appear, their terrors cease, And all the northern world lies hushed in peace.

Methinks I hear the drum's tumultuous sound The victor's shouts and dying groans confound, The dreadful burst of cannon rend the skies, And all the thunder of the battle rise! 'Twas then great Marlborough's mighty soul was proved.

That, in the shock of charging hosts unmoved, Amidst confusion, horror, and despair, Examined all the dreadful scenes of war;

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In peaceful thought the field of death surveyed,
To fainting squadrons sent the timely aid,
Inspired repulsed battalions to engage,
And taught the doubtful battle where to rage.
So when an angel by divine command
With rising tempests shakes a guilty land,
Such as of late o'er pale Britannia past,
Calm and serene he drives the furious blast; 290
And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform,
Rides in the whirlwind, and directs the storm.

But see the haughty household-troops advance!
The dread of Europe, and the pride of France.
The war's whole art each private soldier knows,
And with a general's love of conquest glows;
Proudly he marches on, and, void of fear,
Laughs at the shaking of the British spear:
Vain insolence! with native freedom brave,
The meanest Briton scorns the highest slave. 300

Sleep, my babe; thy food and raiment,
House and home, thy friends provide;
All without thy care or payment:

All thy wants are well supplied.
How much better thou'rt attended
Than the Son of God could be,
When from heaven He descended
And became a child like thee!

Soft and easy is thy cradle:

Coarse and hard thy Saviour lay,
When His birthplace was a stable
And His softest bed was hay.

Blessed babe! what glorious features
Spotless fair, divinely bright!
Must He dwell with brutal creatures?
How could angels bear the sight?

Was there nothing but a manger
Cursed sinners could afford
To receive the heavenly stranger?
Did they thus affront their Lord?

Soft, my child: I did not chide thee, Though my song might sound too hard; 'Tis thy mother sits beside thee,

And her arms shall be thy guard.

See the kinder shepherds round Him,
Telling wonders from the sky!

Where they sought Him, there they found Him,
With His Virgin mother by.

See the lovely babe a-dressing;
Lovely infant, how He smiled!

When He wept, the mother's blessing
Soothed and hush'd the holy child.

Lo, He slumbers in His manger,
Where the hornèd oxen fed;
Peace, my darling; here's no danger,
Here's no ox anear thy bed.

'Twas to save thee, child, from dying,
Save my dear from burning flame,
Bitter groans and endless crying,

That thy blest Redeemer came.

May'st thou live to know and fear Him,
Trust and love Him all thy days;
Then go dwell forever near Him,

See His face, and sing His praise!

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AMBROSE PHILIPS (1675-1749)

TO MISS CHARLOTTE PULTENEY, IN HER MOTHER'S ARMS

Timely blossom, infant fair,
Fondling of a happy pair,
Every morn and every night
Their solicitous delight;
Sleeping, waking, still at ease,
Pleasing, without skill to please;
Little gossip, blithe and hale,
Tattling many a broken tale,
Singing many a tuneless song,
Lavish of a heedless tongue.
Simple maiden, void of art,
Babbling out the very heart,
Yet abandoned to thy will,
Yet imagining no ill,
Yet too innocent to blush;
Like the linnet in the bush,
To the mother-linnet's note
Moduling her slender throat,
Chirping forth thy pretty joys;
Wanton in the change of toys,
Like the linnet green, in May,
Flitting to each bloomy spray;
Wearied then, and glad of rest,
Like the linnet in the nest.
This thy present happy lot,
This, in time, will be forgot;
Other pleasures, other cares,
Ever-busy Time prepares;

And thou shalt in thy daughter see
This picture once resembled thee.

JOHN PHILIPS (1676-1709)

FROM THE SPLENDID SHILLING Happy the man who, void of cares and strife, In silken or in leathern purse retains A Splendid Shilling. He nor hears with pain New oysters cried, nor sighs for cheerful ale; But with his friends, when nightly mists arise, To Juniper's Magpie or Town-hall repairs: Where, mindful of the nymph whose wanton eye Transfixed his soul and kindled amorous flames, Chloe or Phillis, he each circling glass Wishes her health, and joy, and equal love. Meanwhile he smokes, and laughs at merry tale Or pun ambiguous, or conundrum quaint. But I, whom griping penury surrounds, And hunger, sure attendant upon want, With scanty offals, and small acid tiff,

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Wretched repast! my meagre corps sustain:
Then solitary walk, or doze at home
In garret vile, and with a warming puff
Regale chilled fingers; or from tube as black
As winter-chimney, or well-polished jet,
Exhale mundungus, ill-perfuming scent:
Not blacker tube nor of a shorter size
Smokes Cambro-Briton, versed in pedigree,
Sprung from Cadwalador and Arthur, kings
Full famous in romantic tale, when he
O'er many a craggy hill and barren cliff,
Upon a cargo of famed Cestrian cheese,
High overshadowing rides, with a design
To vend his wares, or at th' Arvonian mart,
Or Maridunum, or the ancient town
Ycleped Brechinia, or where Vaga's stream
Encircles Ariconium, fruitful soil!
Whence flows nectareous wines that well may
vie

With Massic, Setin, or renowned Falern.

Thus, while my joyless minutes tedious flow With looks demure and silent pace, a dun, Horrible monster! hated by gods and men, To my aërial citadel ascends.

With vocal heel thrice thundering at my gate, With hideous accent thrice he calls; I know The voice ill-boding, and the solemn sound. What should I do? or whither turn? Amazed, Confounded, to the dark recess I fly

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Such plagues from righteous men! Behind him stalks

Another monster, not unlike himself,
Sullen of aspect, by the vulgar called

A catchpole, whose polluted hands the gods
With force incredible and magic charms
First have endued: if he his ample palm
Should haply on ill-fated shoulder lay
Of debtor, straight his body, to the touch
Obsequious, as whilom knights were wont,
To some enchanted castle is conveyed,
Where gates impregnable and coercive chains
In durance strict detain him till, in form
Of money, Pallas sets the captive free.

бо

THOMAS PARNELL (1679-1718)

FROM A NIGHT-PIECE ON DEATH

By the blue taper's trembling light,
No more I waste the wakeful night,
Intent with endless view to pore
The schoolmen and the sages o'er;
Their books from wisdom widely stray,
Or point at best the longest way.
I'll seek a readier path, and go
Where wisdom's surely taught below.

How deep yon azure dyes the sky,
Where orbs of gold unnumber'd lie,
While through their ranks in silver pride
The nether crescent seems to glide!
The slumbering breeze forgets to breathe,
The lake is smooth and clear beneath,
Where once again the spangled show
Descends to meet our eyes below.
The grounds which on the right aspire,
In dimness from the view retire:
The left presents a place of graves,
Whose wall the silent water laves.
That steeple guides thy doubtful sight
Among the livid gleams of night.
There pass, with melancholy state,
By all the solemn heaps of fate,
And think, as softly-sad you tread
Above the venerable dead,

"Time was, like thee they life possest, And time shall be, that thou shalt rest.”

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Those graves, with bending osier bound,
That nameless heave the crumbled ground, 30
Quick to the glancing thought disclose,
Where toil and poverty repose.

The flat smooth stones that bear a name,

The chisel's slender help to fame,
(Which ere our set of friends decay
Their frequent steps may wear away;)
A middle race of mortals own,

Men, half ambitious, all unknown.
The marble tombs that rise on high,
Whose dead in vaulted arches lie,
Whose pillars swell with sculptur'd stones,
Arms, angels, epitaphs, and bones,
These, all the poor remains of state,
Adorn the rich, or praise the great;
Who while on earth in fame they live,
Are senseless of the fame they give.

Ha! while I gaze, pale Cynthia fades, The bursting earth unveils the shades!

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