Bid us figh on from day to day,

And wish, and with the foul away;

Till youth and genial years are flown,
And all the life of life is gone?
all the life of lif

But bufy bufy ftill art thou,
To bind the loveless joyless vow,
The heart from pleasure to delude,
To join the gentle to the rude.

7

For once, O Fortune, hear my prayer,
And I absolve thy future care;
All other bleffings I refign,

Make but the dear Amanda mine.

HOME, gentle God of foft defire,

COM

Come and poffefs my happy breast, inv.97 20

Not fury-like in flames and fire,

Or frantic folly's wildness dreft;

But come in friendship's angel-guise:
Yet dearer thou than friendship art,
More tender fpirit in thy eyes,

More sweet emotions at the heart.

O come with goodness in thy train,
With peace and pleasure void of storm;
And wouldst thou me forever gain,
Put on Amanda's winning form.

VOL. I.

ODE

NIGHTINGALE, best poet of the grove,

That plaintive strain can ne'er belong to thee, Bleft in the full poffeffion of thy love:

O lend that strain, fweet Nightingale, to me!

'Tis mine, alas! to mourn my wretched fate :
I love a maid who all my bofom charms,
Yet lose my days without this lovely mate;
Inhuman fortune keeps her from my arms.

You, happy birds! by nature's fimple laws
Lead your foft lives, fuftain'd by nature's fare;
You dwell wherever raving fancy draws,
And love and fong is all your pleafing care:

But we, vain slaves of intereft and of pride,

Dare not be bleft left envious tongues should blame:

And hence, in vain, I languifh for my bride;
O mourn with me, fweet bird, my hapless flame.

T

HE wanton's charms, however bright,
Are like the falfe illufive light,

Whose flattering unaufpicious blaze

To precipices oft betrays:

But that fweet ray your beauties dart,

Which clears the mind, and cleans the heart,

Is like the facred Queen of night,
Who pours a lovely gentle light!
Wide o'er the dark, by wanderers bleft,
Conducting them to peace and rest.

A vicious love depraves the mind, I 'Tis anguish, guilt, and folly join'd; But Seraphina's eyes difpenfe.

A mild and gracious influence est qobitat

Such as in vifions angels fhed
Around the heav'n-illumin'd head.
To love thee, Seraphina, fure,
Is to be tender, happy, pure; 515
'Tis from low paffions to escape,
And woo bright virtue's fairest shape
'Tis extafy with wifdom join'd
And heaven infus'd into the mind.

T

A

ETHEREAL race, inhabitants of air,
Who hymn your God amid the secret grove,

Ye unfeen beings, to my harp repair,

And raise majestic strains, or melt in love.

* Aeolus's Harp is a musical instrument, which plays with the wind, invented by Mr Ofwald; its properties are fully described in the Castle of Indolence.

002

II. Thofe

IL

Those tender notes, how kindly they upbraid,
With what soft woe they thrill the lover's heart!
Sure from the hand of fome unhappy maid,

Who dy'd of love, these fweet complainings part.

But hark! that strain was of a graver tone,

On the deep strings his hand some hermit throws; Or he the facred Bard +, who fat alone,

In the drear waste, and wept his people's woes.
IV.

Such was the fong which Zion's children fung,
When by Euphrates ftream they made their plaint:
And to fuch fadly-folemn notes are ftrung

Angelic harps, to foothe a dying faint.
V.

[Methinks I hear the full celeftial choir,

Thro' heaven's high dome their awful anthem raise; Now chanting clear, and now they all confpire To fwell the lofty hymn, from praife to praise. VI.

Let me, ye wand'ring fpirits of the wind,

Who, as wild fancy prompts you, touch the ftring, Smit with your theme, be in your chorus join'd, For, till you ceafe, my Mufe forgets to fing.

·AIL, mildly-pleafing folitude,

H Companion of the wife and good!

But, from whose holy, piercing eye,
The herd of fools and villains fly."
Oh! how I love with thee t to walk,
And listen to thy whifper'd talk,
Which innocence and truth imparts,
And melts the moft obdurate hearts.

3

A thousand shapes you wear with ease,
And still in every fhape you pleafe.
Now wrapt in fonie myfterious dream,
A lone philofopher you feem;
Now quick from hill to vale you fly,
And now you sweep the vaulted Iky.
A fhepherd next, you haunt the plain,,
And warble-forth your oaten strain..
A lover now, with all the grace
Of that sweet paffion in your face:
Then, calm'd to friendship, you affume
The gentle-looking HARTFORD's bloom,
As, with her MUSIDORA, fhe

u haunt the pain. Elsi ! made

(Her MUSIDORA fond of thee)

Amid the long withdrawing valer

Awakes the rival'd nightingale.

Thine is the balmy breath of morn,

Juft as the dew-bent rose is born;

And