O learn, from our example and our fate,
Learn wisdom and repentance ere too late.
Not only vice difpofes and prepares
The mind, that flumbers sweetly in her fnares,
To floop to tyranny's ufurp'd command,
And bend her polish'd neck beneath his hand
(A dire effect, by one of nature's laws
Unchangeably connected with its cause);
But Providence himself will intervene
To throw his dark displeasure o'er the scene.
All are his inftruments; each form of war,
What burns at home, or threatens from afar,
Nature in arms, her elements at ftrife,
The ftorms that overset the joys of life,
Are but his rods to fcourge a guilty land,
And waste it at the bidding of his hand.
He gives the word, and mutiny foon roars
In all her gates, and shakes her distant shores
The ftandards of all nations are unfurl'd;
She has one foe, and that one foe the world.
And, if he doom that people with a frown,
And mark them with a seal of wrath prefs'd down,
Obduracy takes place; callous and tough,
The reprobated race grows judgment proof:
Earth fhakes beneath them and heav'n roars above;
But nothing scares them from the course they love:
To the lafcivious pipe and wanton fong,
That charm down fear, they frolic it along,
With mad rapidity and unconcern,
Down to the gulf from which is no return.
They truft in navies, and their navies fail-
God's curfe can caft away ten thousand fail!
They truft in armies, and their courage dies;
In wifdom, wealth, in fortune, and in lies;
But all they truft in withers, as it must,
When He commands, in whom they place no trust.
Vengeance at laft pours down upon their coaft
A long defpis'd, but now victorious, host;
Tyranny fends the chain that must abridge
The noble sweep of all their privilege;
Gives liberty the last, the mortal fhock;
Slips the flave's collar on, and fnaps the lock.
A. Such lofty ftrains embellish what you teach, Mean you to prophefy, or but to preach?
B. I know the mind that feels indeed the fire The mufe imparts, and can command the lyre, Acts with a force, and kindles with a zeal, Whate'er the theme, that others never feel.
If human woes her soft attention claim,
A tender fympathy pervades the frame,
She pours a fenfibility divine
Along the nerve of ev'ry feeling line.
But, if a deed not tamely to be born
Fire indignation and a fenfe of fcorn,
The firings are fwept with fuch a pow'r so loud, The ftorm of mufic fhakes th' aftonifh'd crowd. So, when remote futurity is brought
Before the keen inquiry of her thought,
A terrible fagacity informs
The poet's heart; he looks to diftant ftorms;
He hears the thunder ere the tempeft low'rs;
And, arm'd with ftrength furpaffing human pow'rs,
Seizes events as yet unknown to man,
And darts his foul into the dawning plan.
Hence, in a Roman mouth, the graceful name
Of prophet and of poet was the fame;
Hence British poets, too, the priesthood fhar'd,
And ev'ry hallow'd druid was a bard.
But no prophetic fires to me belong;
I play with fyllables, and sport in fong.
A. At Westminster, where little poets ftrive To fet a diftich upon fix and five,
Where difcipline helps op'ning buds of fenfe,
And makes his pupils proud with filver-pence,
I was a poet too: but modern tafte
Is fo refin'd, and delicate, and chaste,
That verfe, whatever fire the fancy warms,
Without a creamy smoothness has no charms.
Thus, all fuccess depending on an ear,
And thinking I might purchase it too dear,
If fentiment were facrific'd to found,
And truth cut fhort to make a period round,
I judg'd a man of fenfe could scarce do worse
Than caper in the morris-dance of verse.
B. Thus reputation is a fpur to wit,
And fome wits flag through fear of lofing it.
Give me the line that plows its stately course
Like a proud fwan, conq'ring the ftream by force;
That, like fome cottage beauty, ftrikes the heart,
Quite unindebted to the tricks of art.
When labour and when dulnefs, club in hand,
Like the two figures at St. Dunstan's, ftand,
Beating alternately, in meafur'd time,
The clock-work tintinabulum of rhyme,
Exact and regular the founds will be;
But fuch mere quarter-ftrokes are not for me.
From him who rears a poem lank and long, To him who ftrains his all into a song;
Perhaps fome bonny Caledonian air,
All birks and braes, though he was never there;
Or, having whelp'd a prologue with great pains,
Feels himself spent, and fumbles for his brains;
A prologue interdash'd with many a stroke-
An art contriv'd to advertise a joke,
So that the jeft is clearly to be seen,
Not in the words-but in the gap
Manner is all in all, whate'er is writ,
The fubftitute for genius, fenfe, and wit.
To dally much with subjects mean and low Proves that the mind is weak, or makes it fo. Neglected talents ruft into decay,
And ev'ry effort ends in push-pin play.
The man that means fuccefs fhould foar above
A foldier's feather, or a lady's glove;
Elfe, fummoning the mufe to fuch a theme,
The fruit of all her labour is whipt-cream,
As if an eagle flew aloft, and then-
Stoop'd from its highest pitch to pounce a wren.
As if the poet, purpofing to wed,
Should carve himself a wife in gingerbread.
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