Would you the race of glory run?
Know, the devout, and they alone,
Are equal to the task:
The labours of the illustrious course
Far other than the unaided force
Of human vigour ask,
To arm against repeated ill
The patient heart, too brave to feel
The tortures of despair;
Nor safer yet high-crested pride,
When wealth flows in with every tide
To gain admittance there.
To rescue from the tyrant's sword
The oppressed; unseen and unimplored,
To cheer the face of woe;
From lawless insult to defend
An orphan's right, a fallen friend,
And a forgiven foe ;
These, these distinguish from the crowd,
And these alone, the great and good,
The guardians of mankind;
Whose bosoms with these virtues heave,
Oh, with what matchless speed they leave
The multitude behind!
Then ask ye, from what cause on earth
Virtues like these derive their birth?
Derived from Heaven alone,
Full on that favoured breast they shine,
Where faith and resignation join
To call the blessing down.
Such is that heart;-but while the Muse Thy theme, O Richardson, pursues,
Her feebler spirits faint;
She cannot reach, and would not wrong, That subject for an angel's song,
The hero, and the saint!
IN A LETTER TO C. P., Esq.
GRANT me the Muse, ye gods! whose humble flight Seeks not the mountain-top's pernicious height; Who can the tall Parnassian cliff forsake
To visit oft the still Lethean lake;
Now her slow pinions brush the silent shore,
Now gently skim the unwrinkled waters o'er,
There dips her downy plumes, there upward flies,
And sheds soft slumbers on her votary's eyes.
IN IMITATION OF SHAKESPEARE
TRUST me, the meed of praise, dealt thriftily
From the nice scale of judgment, honours more
Than does the lavish and o'erbearing tide
Of profuse courtesy. Not all the gems
Of India's richest soil at random spread
O'er the gay vesture of some glittering dame
Give such alluring vantage to the person,
As the scant lustre of a few with choice
And comely guise of ornament disposed
SUPPOSED TO BE WRITTEN ON THE MARRIAGE OF A FRIEND
THOU magic lyre, whose fascinating sound
Seduced the savage monsters from their cave, Drew rocks and trees and forms uncouth around, And bade wild Hebrus hush his listening wave; No more thy undulating warblings flow O'er Thracian wilds of everlasting snow!
Awake to sweeter sounds, thou magic lyre,
And paint a lover's bliss-a lover's pain!
Far nobler triumphs now thy notes inspire,
For see, Eurydice attends thy strain;
Her smile, a prize beyond the conjurer's aim,
Superior to the cancelled breath of fame.
From her sweet brow to chase the gloom of care,
To check the tear that dims the beaming eye,
To bid her heart the rising sigh forbear,
And flush her orient cheek with brighter joy,
In that dear breast soft sympathy to move,
And touch the springs of rapture and of love.
Ah me! how long bewildered and astray,
Lost and benighted, did my footsteps rove,
Till sent by Heaven to cheer my pathless way,
A star arose the radiant star of love.
The God propitious joined our willing hands,
And Hymen wreathed us in his rosy bands.
Yet not the beaming eye, or placid brow,
Or golden tresses, hid the subtle dart;
To charms superior far than those I bow,
And nobler worth enslaves my vanquished heart;
The beauty, elegance, and grace combined,
Which beam transcendent from that angel mind.
While vulgar passions, meteors of a day,
Expire before the chilling blasts of age,
Our holy flame with pure and steady ray
Its glooms shall brighten, and its pangs assuage;
By Virtue (sacred vestal) fed, shall shine,
And warm our fainting souls with energy divine.
AN EPISTLE TO ROBERT LLOYD, ESQ.
'Tis not that I design to rob
Thee of thy birthright, gentle Bob,
For thou art born sole heir and single
Of dear Mat Prior's easy jingle;
Nor that I mean, while thus I knit
My threadbare sentiments together,
To show my genius or my wit,
When God and you know I have neither;
Or such, as might be better shown
By letting poetry alone.
'Tis not with either of these views
That I presume to address the Muse :
But to divert a fierce banditti
(Sworn foes to every thing that's witty)
That, with a black infernal train,
Make cruel inroads in my brain,
And daily threaten to drive thence
My little garrison of sense :
The fierce banditti which I mean,
Are gloomy thoughts led on by spleen.
Then there's another reason yet,
Which is, that I may fairly quit
The debt which justly became due
The moment when I heard from you :
And you might grumble, crony mine,
If paid in any other coin;
Since twenty sheets of lead, God knows,
(I would say twenty sheets of prose,)
Can ne'er be deemed worth half so much
As one of gold, and yours was such.
Thus the preliminaries settled,
I fairly find myself pitch-kettled;
And cannot see, though few see better,
How I shall hammer out a letter.
First, for a thought-since all agree-
A thought-I have it-let me see-
'Tis gone again-plague on't! I thought
I had it but I have it not.
Dame Gurton thus, and Hodge her son,
That useful thing, her needle, gone,
Rake well the cinders, sweep the floor,
And sift the dust behind the door;
While eager Hodge beholds the prize
In old grimalkin's glaring eyes;
And Gammer finds it on her knees
In every shining straw she sees.
This simile were apt enough;
But I've another, critic-proof.
The virtuoso thus at noon
Broiling beneath a July sun,
The gilded butterfly pursues
O'er hedge and ditch, through gaps and mews,
And, after many a vain essay,
To captivate the tempting prey,
Gives him at length the lucky pat,
And has him safe beneath his hat:
Then lifts it gently from the ground;
But ah! 'tis lost as soon as found;
Culprit his liberty regains;
Flits out of sight and mocks his pains.
The sense was dark, 'twas therefore fit
With simile to illustrate it;
But, as too much obscures the sight,
As often as too little light,
We have our similes cut short,
For matters of more grave import.
That Matthew's numbers run with ease
Each man of common sense agrees;
All men of common sense allow
That Robert's lines are easy too;
Where then the preference shall we place,
Or how do justice in this case?
"Matthew," says Fame, "with endless pains
Smoothed and refined the meanest strains,
Nor suffered one ill-chosen rhyme
To escape him at the idlest time
And thus o'er all a lustre cast,
That while the language lives shall last."
"An't please your ladyship," quoth I,
(For 'tis my business to reply,)
"Sure so much labour, so much toil,
Bespeak at least a stubborn soil.
Theirs be the laurel-wreath decreed
Who both write well and write full speed;
Who throw their Helicon about
As freely as a conduit spout!
Friend Robert thus, like chien sçavant,
Lets fall a poem en passant,
Nor needs his genuine ore refine;
'Tis ready polished from the mine."
If I write not to you
As I gladly would do
To a Man of your Mettle and Sense,
'Tis a Fault I must own
For which I'll attone
When I take my Departure from hence.
To tell you the Truth
I'm a queer kind of Youth,
And I care not if all the world knows it ;
Whether Sloven or Beau,
In Square, Alley, or Row,
At Whitehall, in the Court or the Closet.
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