but princes' swords are sharper than their styles: in empty airy contemplations dwell, and for that lethargy was there no cure Can knowledge have no bound, but must advance so far, to make us wish for ignorance, and rather in the dark to grope our way than led by a false guide to err by day? Who sees these dismal heaps but would demand what barbarous invader sack'd the land? but when he hears no Goth, no Turk, did bring this desolation, but a Christian king; when nothing but the name of zeal appears 'twixt our best actions and the worst of their's; what does he think our sacrilege would spare, when such th' effects of our devotions are? parting from thence 'twixt anger, shame, and fear, those for what's past, and this for what's too near, my eye descending from the Hill, surveys where Thames among the wanton vallies strays. Thames! the most lov'd of all the Ocean's sons, by his old sire, to his embraces runs, hasting to pay his tribute to the sea, like mortal life to meet eternity; tho' with those streams he no resemblance hold, whose foam is amber, and their gravel gold: his genuine and less guilty wealth t' explore, the mower's hopes, nor mock the ploughman's toil; So that to us no thing, no place, is strange, (for things of wonder give no less delight * The forest, tho' these delights from several causes move, for so our children, thus our friends, we love) wisely she knew the harmony of things, as well as that of sounds, from discord springs. Such was the discord which did first disperse form, order, beauty, through the universe ; while dryness moisture, coldness heat resists, all that we have, and that we are, subsists; while the steep horrid roughness of the wood strives with the gentle calmness of the flood, such huge extremes when Nature doth unite, wonder from thence results, from thence delight. The stream is so transparent, pure, and clear, that had the self-enamour'd youth † gaz'd here, so fatally deceiv'd he had not been, while he the bottom, not his face, had seen. But his proud head the airy mountain hides among the clouds; his shoulders and his sides a shady mantle clothes; his curled brows frown on the gentle stream, which calmly flows, while winds and storms his lofty forehead beat; the common fate of all that's high or great. Low at his foot a spacious plain is plac'd, between the mountain and the stream embrac❜d, which shade and shelter from the Hill derives, while the kind river wealth and beauty gives, and in the mixture of all these appears variety, which all the rest endears. This scene had some bold Greek or British bard beheld of old, what stories had we heard of Fairies, Satyrs, and the Nymphs their dames, their feasts, their revels, and their am'rous flames? 'Tis still the same, although their airy shape all but a quick poetic sight escape. + Narcissus. There Faunus and Sylvanus keep their courts, to graze the ranker mead; that noble herd of youth, whose hopes a nobler prey devour; had given this false alarm, but straight his view confirms that more than all he fears is true. Betray'd in all his strengths, the wood beset, all instruments, all arts of ruin met, he calls to mind his strength, and then his speed, his winged heels, and then his armed head; with these t'avoid, with that his fate to meet; but fear prevails, and bids him trust his feet, So fast he flies, that his reviewing eye has lost the chasers, and his ear the cry; exulting, till he finds their nobler sense their disproportion'd speed doth recompense; then curses his conspiring feet, whose scent betrays that safety which their swiftness lent: then tries his friends; among the baser herd, so much his love was dearer than his life. and doubt a greater mischief than despair. Then to the stream, when neither friends, nor force, nor speed, nor art, avail, he shapes his course; thinks not their rage so desp'rate to essay |