But most in courts, where proud Ambition towers;

Deluded wight! who weens fair peace can spring

Beneath the pompous dome of kesar or of king.

See in each sprite some various bent appear!

These rudely carol, most incondite lay; Those sauntering on the green, with jocund leer

Salute the stranger passing on his way; Some builden fragile tenements of clay, Some to the standing lake their courses bend,

With pebbles smooth at duck and drake to play;

Thilk to the huckster's savoury cottage tend,

In pastry kings and queens th' allotted mite to spend.

Here as each season yields a different store,

Each season's stores in order ranged been, Apples with cabbage-net y'cover'd o'er, Galling full sore th' unmoney'd wight,

O'er all that edge of pain, the social pow'rs

To this their proper action and their end ?

Ask thy own heart; when, at the midnight hour,

Slow through that studious gloom thy pausing eye,

Led by the glimm'ring taper, moves around

The sacred volumes of the dead, the songs Of Grecian bards, and records writ by Fame

For Grecian heroes, where the present pow'r

Of heav'n and earth surveys th' immortal page,

E'en as a father blessing, while he reads The praises of his son; if then thy sol Spurning the yoke of these inglorious days,

Mix in their deeds and kindle with their flame:

Say, when the prospect blackens on thy view,

When rooted from the base, heroic states Mourn in the dust, and tremble at the frown [band Of curs'd Ambition ;-when the pious Of youths that fought for freedom and their sires

To sweep the works of Glory from their base;

Till Desolation o'er the grass-grown

street

Expands his raven wings, and up the wall,

Where senates once the pride of monarchs doom'd,

Hisses the gliding snake through hoary weeds,

That clasp the mould'ring column :-thus defac'd,

Thus widely mournful when the prospect thrills

Thy beating bosom, when the patriot's

tear

Starts from thine eye, and thy extended

arm

In fancy hurls the thunderbolt of Jove, To fire the impious wreath on Philip's brow,

Or dash Octavius from the trophied car ;Say, does thy secret soul repine to taste The big distress? or wouldst thou then exchange

Those heart-ennobling sorrows for the lot Of him who sits amid the gaudy head

Of mute barbarians bending to his nod And bears aloft his gold-invested front, And says within himself, "I am a king, "And wherefore should the clam'rous voice of Woe

"Intrude upon mine ear?"-The baleful dregs

Of these late ages, this inglorious draught
Of servitude and folly, have not yet,
Blest be th' Eternal Ruler of the world!
Defil'd to such a depth of sordid shame
The native honours of the human soul,
Nor so effac'd the image of its sire.

ON TASTE.

SAY, what is Taste, but the internal pow'rs

Active and strong, and feelingly alive
To each fine impulse? a discerning sense
Of decent and sublime, with quick disgust
From things deform'd, or disarrang'd, or
gross

In species? This nor gems, nor stores of gold,

Nor purple state, nor culture can bestow; But God alone, when first his active hand Imprints the sacred bias of the soul.

He, Mighty Parent! wise and just in all, Free as the vital breeze, or light of heav'n,

Reveals the charms of Nature. Ask the swain

Who journeys homeward from a summer-day's

Long labour, why, forgetful of his toils
And due repose, he loiters to behold
The sunshine gleaming as through amber

And shelter from the blast, in vain we Поре

The tender plant should rear its blooming head,

Or yield the harvest promis'd in its spring.
Nor yet will ev'ry soil with equal stores
Repay the tiller's labour; or attend
His will, obsequious, whether to produce
The olive or the laurel. Diff'rent minds
Incline to diff'rent objects one pursues
The vast alone, the wonderful, the wild;
Another sighs for harmony and grace,
And gentlest beauty. Hence when light-
ning fires

The arch of heav'n, and thunders rock the ground;

When furious whirlwinds rend the howl. ing air,

And Ocean, groaning from his lowest bed,

Heaves his tempestuous billows to the sky;

Amid the mighty uproar, while below The nations tremble, Shakspeare looks abroad

From some high cliff, superior, and enjoys The elemental war. But Waller longs, All on the margin of some flow'ry stream, To spread his careless limbs, amid the cool

Of plantane shades, and to the list'ning deer

The tale of slighted vows and Love's disdain

Resounds, soft warbling, all the livelong day.

Consenting Zephyr sighs; the weeping rill

Joins in his plaint, melodious; mute the