a

The applause of listening senates to command,The threats of pain and ruin to despise,

To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, And read their bistory in a nation's eyes,

Their lot forbade: nor circumscrib’d, alone, Their growing virtues,--but their crimes confin'd;

Forbade to wade thro' slaughter to a throne; And shut the gate of mercy on mankind;

The struggling pangs of conscious Truth to hide; To quench the blushes of ingenuous Shame;

Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride With incense kindled at the Muse's flame!

Yet, even these bones from insult to protect, Some frail memorial, still erected nigh, With uncouth rhymes, and shapeless sculpture,

deck'd, Implores the passing tribute of a sigh. Their names, their years, spelt by the unletter'd

Muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply ;

And many a holy text around she strews-
That teach the rustic moralist to die.

For who, to dumb Forgetfulness a prey, This pleasing, anxious being e'er resign'd,

Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, Nor cast one longing-lingering look behind?

On some fond breast the parting soul relies Some pious drops the closing eye requires;

Even from the tomb, the voice of Nature cries, Even in our ashes, live their wonted fires.

For thee, who, mindful of the unhonor'd dead, Dost, in these lines, their artless tale relate,

By chance and lonely Contemplation led, To wander in the gloomy walks of fate;

Hark! how the sacred calm that breathes around, Bids every

fierce tumultuous passion cease ; In still small accents whispering from the ground A grateful earaest of eternal peace!

ܪ

No more, with nature and thyself at strife, Give anxious cares and endless wishes room,

But thro’ the cool sequester’d vale of life Pursue the noiseless tenor of thy doom.

THE COMMENCEMENT

ог

YOUNG'S NIGHT THOUGHTS. Tır'd Nature's sweet restorer, balmy Sleep! He, like the world, his ready visit pays Where Fortune smiles; the wretched he forsakes; Swift on his downy pinion flies from wo, And lights on lids unsully'd with a tear.

From short, (as usual) and disturbed repose,
I wake : how happy they, who wake no more !
Yet that were vain, if dreams infest the grave.
I wake, emerging from a sea of dreams
Tumultuous; where my wreck'd desponding thought,
From wave to wave of fancy'd misery,
At random drove, her helm of reason lost.
Tho' now restored, 'tis only change of pain,
(A bitter change!) severer for severe.
The Day too short for my distress; and Night,
Even in the zenith of her dark domain,
Is sunshine to the colour of my fate.

Night, sable goddess! from her ebon throne,
In rayless majesty, now stretches forth
Her leaden sceptre o'er a slumbering world.
Silence, how dead: and darkness, how profound!
Nor eye, nor list’ning ear, an object finds;
Creation sleeps. "Tis as the general pulse
Of life stood still, and nature made a pause;
An awful pause! prophetic of her end.
And let her prophesy be soon fulfill'd;
Fate! drop the curtain; I can lose no more.

Silence and darkness! solemn sisters! twins
From ancient Night, who nurse the tender thought
To Reason, and on Reason build Resolve,
(That column of true majesty in man)

Assist
me; I will thank

you

in the grave; The grave, your kingdom; there this frame shall fall A victim sacred to your dreary shrine.

SATAN
Calling the fallen Angels from the Oblivious Pool.

MILTON. P. L. B. 1.
He scarce had ceas’d, when the superior fiend
Was moving tow'rd the shore; his ponderous shield
(Ethereal temper, massy, large, and round)
Behind him cast! the broad circumference
Hung on his shoulders, like the moon, whose orb,
Thro' optic glass, the Tuscan artist views,
At evening, from the top of Fiesolé,
Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands,
Rivers or mountains, in her spotty globe.
His spear to equal which the tallest pine
Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast
Of some great ammiral, were but a wand)
He walkd with to support uneasy steps
Over the burning marl—(not like those steps
On heaven's azure!)—and the torrid clim e
Smote on him sore besides, vaulted with fire.
Nathless he so endur'd, till on the beach
Of that inflamed sea he stood, and call’d
His legions, angel forms, who lay, entranc'd,
Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks
In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades,
High over-arch'd, imbower; or scatter'd sedge
Afloat, when, with fierce winds, Orion, arm’d,
Hath vex'd the Red Sea Coast-whose waves o'er-

threw
Busiris and his Memphian chivalry,
While with perfidious hatred they pursu'd
The sojourners of Goshen,—who beheld,
From the safe shore, their floating carcases
And broken Chariot wheels: so, thick bestrown,
Abject, and lost, lay these, covering the flood,
Under amazement of their hideous change.

He call’d so loud, that all the hollow deep
Of hell resounded.

« Princes! potentates! 6 Warriors! the flower of heaven, once yours, now

lost, If such astonishment as this can seize “ Eternal spirits: or have ye chosen this place, « After the toil of battle, to repose " Your wearied virtue,—for the ease you find “ To slumber here, as in the vales of heaven? « Or in this abject posture have ye sworn “ To adore the conquerer? who now beholds. « Cherub and Seraph rolling in the flood, « With scatter'd arms and ensigns; till, anon, “ His swift pursuers, from heaven-gates, discern “ The advantage, and, descending, tread us down, “ Thus drooping; or, with linked thunderbolts, « Transfix us to the bottom of this gulph.

-Awake! arise!-or be for ever fallen!" They heard, and were abash'd, and up they sprung Upon the wing; as when men wont to watch On duty, sleeping found by whom they dread, Rouse, and bestir themselves ere well awake.

OTHELLO'S ADDRESS TO THE SENATE.

SHAKSPEARE. Most potent, grave, and reverend signors, My very noble and approv'd good masters; That I have taken away this old man's daughter, It is most true; true, I have married her; The very head and front of my offending Hath this extent—no more. Rude am I in speech, And little bless'd with the set phrase of peace; For since these arms of mine had seven years pith, 'Till now, some nine moons wasted, they have us'd Their dearest action in the tented field; And little of this great world can I speak More than pertains to feats of broil and battle; And, therefore, little shall I grace my cause,

In speaking for myself; yet, by your patience,
I will a round unvarnish'd tale deliver
Of my whole course of love:—what drugs, what

charms,
What conjuration, and what mighty magic,
(For such proceeding I am charg'd withal)
I won his daughter with.
Her father lov'd me; oft invited me;
Still question'd me the story of my life,
From year to year; the battles, sieges, fortunes,
That I have past.
I run it thro',

even from

my boyish days,
To the very moment that he bade me tell it.
Wherein I spoke of most disastrous chances;
Of moving accidents, by flood and field;
Of hair-breadth 'scapes in the imminent deadly

breach;
Of being taken by the insolent foe,
And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence;-
Of battles bravely, hardly fought; of victories,
For which the conquerer mourn'd—so many fell!
Sometimes I told the story of a siege,
Wherein I had to combat plagues and famine:
Soldiers unpaid; fearful to fight, yet bold
In dangerous mutiny.

These things to hear
Would Desdemona seriously incline:
But still the house affairs would draw her thence;-
Which ever as she could with haste dispatch,
She'd come again, and with a greedy ear
Devour up my discourse: which I observing,
Took once a pliant hour; and found good means
To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart,1
That I would all my pilgrimage dilate, -
Whereof by parcels she had something heard,
But not distinctively. I did consent;
And often did beguile her of her tears,
When I did speak of some distressful stroke
That my youth suffer'd. My story being done,
She gave me for my pains a world of sighs!
She swore, “In faith 'twas strange, 'twas passing