Cambridge Repository. Most of these compositions were the amusement of his early life, and written during his residence at Cambridge. His distinguishing talent was chastened humour, and he was very happy in his attempts at parody, of which there are few better specimens than the "Evening Contemplation in a College;" his application of the old ballad of Chevy Chace, is also excellent of its kind. His more elaborate pieces are not his best; he was a disciple of the school of Pope, and though he wrote generally with elegance, and occasionally with the peculiar harmony and spirit of his great master, the labour of composition is too often apparent. Generally speaking, he was unfortunate in his selection of subjects; most of his poems, being on temporary topics, or addressed to persons eminent only during their lives, have now lost their ́interest, and cannot be read with the same pleasure at the present day, as at the period of their first appearance.
Or Female Genius. 1754.
Shall lordly Man, the theme of every lay,
Usurp the muse's tributary bay;
In kingly state on Pindus' summit sit,
Tyrant of verse, and arbiter of wit?
By Salic law the female right deny,
And view their genius with regardless eye?
Justice forbid! and every muse inspire
To sing the glories of a sister-choir!
Rise, rise, bold swain; and to the list'ning grove
Resound the praises of the sex you love,
Tell how, adorn'd with every charm, they shine
In mind and person equally divine,
Till man, no more to female merit blind,
Admire the person, but adore the mind.
To these weak strains, O thou! the sex's friend
And constant patron, Richardson! attend!
Thou, who so oft with pleas'd, but anxious care,
Hast watch'd the dawning genius of the fair,
With wonted smiles wilt hear thy friend display
The various graces of the female lay;
Studious from folly's yoke their minds to free,
And aid the generous cause espous'd by thee.
Long o'er the world did Prejudice maintain,
By sounds like these, her undisputed reign:
"Woman! she cry'd, to thee, indulgent heaven
Has all the charms of outward beauty given:
Be thine the boast unrival'd to enslave
The great, the wise, the witty, and the brave;
Deck'd with the Paphian rose's damask glow,
And the vale-lily's vegetable snow,
Be thine, to move majestic in the dance,
To roll the eye, and aim the tender glance;
Or touch the strings, and breathe the melting song,
Content to emulate that airy throng,
Who to the sun their painted plumes display,
And gaily glitter on the hawthorn spray,
Or wildly warble in the beechen grove,
Careless of ought but music, joy, and love."-
Heavens! could such artful, slavish sounds beguile
The freeborn sons of Britain's polish'd isle ?
Could they, like fam'd Ulysses' dastard crew,
Attentive listen, and enamour'd view,
Nor drive the syren to that dreary plain,
In loathsome pomp, where eastern tyrants reign;
Where each fair neck the yoke of slav'ry galls,
Clos'd in a proud seraglio's gloomy walls,
And taught, that level'd with the brutal kind,
Nor sense, nor souls to women are assign'd.
Our British nymphs with happier omens rove,
At freedom's call, through wisdom's sacred grove,
And as, with lavish hand, each sister grace
Shapes the fair form and regulates the face,
Each sister muse, in blissful union join'd,
Adorns, improves, and beautifies the mind.
Ev'n now fond fancy in our polish'd land
Assembled shows a blooming, studious band;
With various arts our rev'rence they engage,
Some turn the tuneful, some the moral page:
These, led by contemplation, soar on high,
And range the heav'ns with philosophic eye;
While those, surrounded by a vocal choir,
The canvas tinge, or touch the warbling lyre.
Here, like the stars' mix'd radiance, they unite
To dazzle and perplex our wand'ring sight.
The muse each charmer singly shall survey;
Thus may she best their vary'd charms display,
And tune to each her tributary lay.
So when, in blended tints, with sweet surprize
Assembled beauties strike our ravish'd eyes,
Such as in Lely's melting colours shine,
Or spring, great Kneller! from a hand like thine;
On all with pleasing awe at once we gaze,
And lost in wonder know not which to praise,
But, singly view'd, each nymph delights us more,
Disclosing graces unperceived before,
First let the muse with generous ardor try To chase the mist from dark opinion's eye : Nor mean we here to blame that father's care, Who guards from learned wives his booby heir, Since oft that heir with prudence has been known, To dread a genius that transcends his own: The wise themselves should with discretion chuse, Since letter'd nymphs their knowledge may abuse, And husbands oft experience, to their cost, The prudent housewife in the scholar lost : But those incur deserv'd contempt, who prize Their own high talents, and their sex despise, With haughty mien each social bliss defeat, And sully all their learning with conceit : Of such the parent justly warns his son, And such the muse herself will bid him shun.
But lives there one, whose unassuming mind, Though grac'd by nature, and by art refin'd, Pleas'd with domestic excellence, can spare Some hours to studious ease from social care, And with her pen that time alone employs Which others waste in visits, cards, and noise; From affectation free, though deeply read,
"With wit well natur'd, and with books well bred ?"
With such, and such there are,-each happy day
Must fly improving and improv❜d away;
Inconstancy might fix and settle there,
And wisdom's voice approve the chosen fair,
Nor need we now from our own Britain rove,
In search of genius, to the Lesbian grove,
Though Sappho there her tuneful lyre has strung,
And am 'rous griefs in sweetest accents sung;
Since here, in Charles's days, amidst a train
Of shameless bards, licentious and profane,
The chaste Orinda rose; with purer light,
Like modest Cynthia, beaming through the night:
Fair friendship's lustre, undisguis'd by art,
Glows in her lines, and animates her heart;
Friendship, that jewel, which, though all confess
Its peerless value, yet how few possess !
For her the never-dying myrtle weaves
A verdant chaplet of her od❜rous leaves;
Her praise, re-echo'd by the muse's throng,
Will reach far distant times, and live as long
As Cowley's wit, or fam'd Roscommon's song.
Who can unmov'd hear Winchelsea ↑ reveal
Thy horrors, spleen! which all who paint must feel?
My praises would but wrong her sterling wit,
Since Pope himself applauds what she has writ.
But say, what matron now walks musing forth
From the bleak mountains of her native north?
While round her bows two sisters of the nine
Poetic wreaths with philosophic twine!
Hail, Cockburn, ‡ hail! even now from reason's bow'rs
Thy Locke delighted culls the choicest flow'rs
To deck his great, successful champion's head;
And Clarke expects thee in the laurel shade.
Though long to dark oblivious want a prey,
Thy aged worth pass'd unperceiv'd away,
Yet Scotland now shall ever boast thy fame,
While England mourns thy undistingush'd name,
And views with wonder, in a female mind,
Philosopher, divine, and poet join'd!
* Mrs Catherine Philips. Anne, Countess of Winchelsea Mrs. Catherine Cockburn, the wife of a clergyman; she lived obscurely, and died at an advanced age, in Northumberland
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