THE DEDICATION. TO MR. VOLTAIRE. My muse, a bird of I. Y muse, a bird of passage, flies From frozen climes to milder skies; From chilling blasts she seeks thy chearing beam, II. * To dive full deep in antient days, The warrior's ardent deeds to raise, And monarchs aggrandize;—the glory, Thine; Thine is the drama, how renown'd! Thine, Epic's loftier trump to sound ;But let ARION's sea-strung harp be Mine: * Annals of the Emperor CHARLES XII, Lewis XIV. III. But where's his dolphin? Know'st thou, where?— May that be found in Thee, VOLTAIRE! Save thou from harm my plunge into the wave: How will thy name illustrious raise My sinking song! Mere mortal lays, So patroniz'd, are rescu'd from the grave. IV. "Tell me," say'st thou," who courts my smile? "What stranger stray'd from yonder isle ?”— No stranger, Sir! though born in foreign climes; On Dorset downs, when MILTON's page, Wit Sin and Death, provok'd thy rage, Thy rage provok'd, who sooth'd with gentle rhymes? V. Who kindly couch'd thy censure's eye, Sound judgment giving law to fancy strong? Nor could thy modesty do less, That MILTON's blindness lay not in his song? VI. But such debates long since are flown; On airy pastimes, ere our brows were grey: To thee my patron, I my debt, And thou to thine, for Prussia's golden key. |