STANZAS Subjoined to the yearly Bill of Mortality of the Parish of All-Saints, Northampton'. ANNO DOMINI 1787. Pallida Mors æquo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas, Pale Death with equal foot strikes wide the door HOR. WHILE thirteen moons saw smoothly run All these, life's rambling journey done, Was man (frail always) made more frail Did famine or did plague prevail, That so much death appears? No; these were vigorous as their sires, Like crowded forest-trees we stand, 1 Composed for John Cox, parish clerk of Northampton. Green as the bay tree, ever green, The gay, the thoughtless have I seen, I pass'd-and they were gone. Read, ye that run, the awful truth With which I charge my page; A worm is in the bud of youth And at the root of age. No present health can health ensure And O! that, humble as my lot, These truths, though known, too much forgot, So prays your clerk with all his heart, And ere he quits the pen, Begs you for once to take his part, And answer all-Amen! Improve the present hour, for all beside COULD I, from Heaven inspired, as sure presage How each would trembling wait the mournful sheet, On which the press might stamp him next to die; And, reading here his sentence, how replete With anxious meaning, heavenward turn his eye! Time then would seem more precious than the joys Then doubtless many a trifler, on the brink Of this world's hazardous and headlong shore, Forced to a pause, would feel it good to think, Told that his setting sun must rise no more. VOL. II. A A Ah self-deceived! Could I prophetic say Observe the dappled foresters, how light They bound and airy o'er the sunny gladeOne falls-the rest, wide-scatter'd with affright, Vanish at once into the darkest shade. Had we their wisdom, should we, often warn'd, Die self-accused of life run all to waste? Sad waste! for which no after thrift atones; Learn then, ye living! by the mouths be taught And the next opening grave may yawn for you. A ON A SIMILAR OCCASION, FOR THE YEAR 1789. -Placidaque ibi demum morte quievit. VIRG. There calm at length he breathed his soul away. 'O MOST delightful hour by man The hour that terminates his span, • Worlds should not bribe me back to tread Again life's dreary waste, With all the gloomy past. 'My home henceforth is in the skies; All heaven unfolded to my eyes, So spake Aspasio, firm possess'd He was a man among the few Sincere on virtue's side; And all his strength from Scripture drew, To hourly use applied. That rule he prized, by that he fear'd, He hated, hoped, and loved; Nor ever frown'd or sad appear'd, But when his heart had roved. |