ON A SIMILAR OCCASION, FOR THE YEAR 1789. -Placidaque ibi demum morte quievit. Virg. There calm at length he breathed his soul away. "OH most delightful hour by man Experienced here below, The hour that terminates his span, His folly, and his woe! "Worlds should not bribe me back to tread Again life's dreary waste, To see again my day o'erspread With all the gloomy past. "My home henceforth is in the skies; Earth, seas, and sun adieu! All heaven unfolded to my eyes, I have no sight for you." So spoke Aspasio, firm possest Then breathed his soul into its rest, The bosom of his God. He was a man, among the few, And all his strength from scripture drew, To hourly use applied. That rule he prized, by that he feared, He hated, hoped, and loved; For he was frail as thou or I, And evil felt within; But, when he felt it, heaved a sigh, Such lived Aspasio; and at last His joys be mine, each reader cries, ON A SIMILAR OCCASION, FOR THE YEAR 1790. He who sits from day to day, Where the watchman in his round So your verse-man I, and clerk, Duly at my time I come, Publishing to all aloud— Soon the grave must be your home, But the monitory strain, Oft repeated in your ears, Seems to sound too much in vain, Wins no notice, wakes no fears. Can a truth, by all confessed Of such magnitude and weight, Grow, by being oft expressed, Trivial as a parrot's prate? Pleasure's call attention wins, Hear it often as we may; Death and judgment, heaven and hell— When some stranger is interred. Oh then, ere the turf or tomb Cover us from every eye, Spirit of instruction come, Make us learn that we must die. ON A SIMILAR OCCASION, FOR THE YEAR 1792. Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas, Happy the mortal, who has traced effects THANKLESS for favours from on high, But he, not wise enough to scan To ages in a world of pain, To ages, where he goes Galled by affliction's heavy chain, And hopeless of repose. Strange fondness of the human heart, Strange world, that costs it so much smart, Whence has the world her magic power? Recoil from weary life's best hour, The cause is Conscience-Conscience oft Her tale of guilt renews: Her voice is terrible though soft, Then anxions to be longer spared 'Tis judgment shakes him; there's the fear, Pay!-follow Christ, and all is paid; ON A SIMILAR OCCASION, FOR THE YEAR 1793. De sacris autem hæc sit una sententia, ut conserventur. Cic. de Leg. But let us all concur in this one sentiment, that things sacred be inviolate. He lives who lives to God alone, For other source than God is none |