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Interpret to the marking eye distress,
Such as its symptoms can alone express.
That tongue is silent now; that silent tongue,
Could argue once, could jest or join the song,
Could give advice, could censure or commend,
Or charm the sorrows of a drooping friend.
Renounc'd alike its office, and its sport,
Its brisker and its graver strains fall short;
Both fail beneath a fever's secret sway,
And like a summer brook are pass'd away.
This is a sight for pity to peruse,

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Till she resemble faintly what she views,

Till Sympathy contract a kindred pain,

Pierc'd with the woes that she laments in vain.

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This, of all maladies that man infest,

Claims most compassion, and receives the least:
Job felt it when he groan'd beneath the rod
And the barb'd arrows of a frowning God;
And such emollients as his friends could spare,
Friends such as his for modern Jobs prepare.
Bless'd, rather curs'd, with hearts that never feel,
Kept snug in caskets of close-hammer'd steel,
With mouths made only to grin wide and eat,
And minds that deem derided pain a treat,
With limbs of British oak, and nerves of wire,
And wit that puppet-prompters might inspire,
Their sovereign nostrum is a clumsy joke,
On pangs enforc'd with God's severest stroke.
But with a soul, that ever felt the sting
Of sorrow, sorrow is a sacred thing:
Not to molest, or irritate, or raise

A laugh at his expense, is slender praise :
He that has not usurp'd the name of man,
Does all, and deems too little all, he can,
T'assuage the throbbings of the fester'd part,
And stanch the bleedings of a broken heart.
'Tis not as heads that never ache suppose,
Forgery of fancy, and a dream of woes;
VOL. I.

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Man is a harp, whose chords elude the sight,
Each yielding harmony dispos'd aright;
The screws revers'd, (a task which if he please
God in a moment executes with ease,)
Ten thousand thousand springs at once go loose,
Lost, till he tune them, all their power and use.
Then neither heathy wilds, nor scenes as fair
As ever recompens'd the peasant's care,
Nor soft declivities with tufted hills,
Nor view of waters turning busy mills,
Parks in which Art preceptress Nature weds,
Nor gardens interspers'd with flow'ry beds,

Nor gales, that catch the scent of blooming groves,
And waft it to the mourner as he roves,

Can call up life into his faded eye,

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That passes all he sees unheeded by ;

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No wounds like those a wounded spirit feels,

No cure for such, till God, who makes them, heals.

And thou, sad suff'rer under nameless ill,

That yields not to the touch of human skill,
Improve the kind occasion, understand

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A Father's frown, and kiss his chast ning hand.
To thee the day-spring and the blaze of noon,
The purple ev'ning and resplendent moon,

The stars that, sprinkled o'er the vault of night,

Seem drops descending in a show'r of light,

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Shine not, or undesir'd and hated shine,

Seen through the medium of a cloud like thine;

Yet seek him, in his favour life is found,

All bliss beside a shadow or a sound;

Then Heav'n eclips'd so long, and this dull earth, 355
Shall seem to start into a second birth;

Nature, assuming a more lovely face,

Borrowing a beauty from the works of grace,

Shall be despis'd and overlook'd no more,
Shall fill thee with delights unfolt before,
Impart to things inanimate a voice,

And bids her mountains and her hills rejoice;

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The sound shall run along the winding vales,
And thou enjoy an Eden ere it fails.

Ye groves, (the statesman at his desk exclaims, 365 Sick of a thousand disappointed aims,)

My patrimonial treasure and my pride,
Beneath your shades your gray possessor hide,
Receive me languishing for that repose,
The servant of the publick never knows.
Ye saw me once, (ah those regretted days,
When boyish innocence was all my praise !)
Hour after hour delightfully allot

To studies then familiar, since forgot,
And cultivate a taste for ancient song,
Catching its ardour as I mus'd along ;

Nor seldom, as propitious Heav'n might send,
What once I valu'd and could boast, a friend,
Were witnesses how cordially I press'd

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His undissembling virtue to my breast;
Receive me now, not uncorrupt as then,
Nor guiltless of corrupting other men,

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But vers'd in arts, that while they seem to stay

A falling empire, hasten its decay,

To the fair haven of my native home,

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The wreck of what I was, fatigued I come;

For once I can approve the patriot's voice,

And make the course he recommends my choice:

We meet at last in one sincere desire,

His wish and mine both prompt me to retire.

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"Tis done-he steps into the welcome chaise, Lolls at his ease behind four handsome bays,

That whirl away from business and debate

The disencumber'd Atlas of the state.

Ask not the boy, who, when the breeze of morn

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First shakes the glitt'ring drops from ev'ry thorn,

Unfolds his flock, then under bank or bush

Sits linking cherry stones, or platting rush,

How fair is freedom!-he was always free;

To carve his rustick name upon a tree,

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To snare the mole, or with ill-fashion'd hook
To draw the incautious minnow from the brook,
Are life's prime pleasures in his simple view,
His flock the chief concern he ever knew;
She shines but little in his heedless eyes,

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The good we never miss we rarely prize :
But ask the noble drudge in state affairs,
Escap'd from office and its constant cares,

What charms he sees in Freedom's smile express'd, In Freedom lost so long, now repossess'd;

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The tongue, whose strains were cogent as commands, Rever'd at home, and felt in foreign lands,

Shall own itself a stamm'rer in that cause,
Or plead its silence as its best applause.

He knows, indeed, that, whether dress'd or rude, 415
Wild without art, or artfully subdu'd,
Nature in ev'ry form inspires delight,

But never mark'd her with so just a sight.
Her hedge-row shrubs, a variegated store,
With woodbine, and wild roses mantled o'er,

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Green balks and furrow'd lands, the stream, that

spreads

Its cooling vapour o'er the dewy meads,

Downs, that almost escape th' inquiring eye,
That melt and fade into the distant sky,
Beauties he lately slighted as he pass'd,
Seem all created since he travell'd last.
Master of all th' enjoyments he design'd,
No rough annoyance rankling in his mind,
What early philosophick hours he keeps,
How regular his meals, how sound he sleeps!
Not sounder he, that on the mainmast head,
While morning kindles with a windy red,
Begins a long look-out for distant land,
Nor quits till evening watch his giddy stand,
Then, swift descending with a seaman's haste,
Slips to his hammock, and forgets the blast.

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He chooses company, but not the squire's,
Whose wit is rudeness, whose good breeding tires;
Nor yet the parson's, who would gladly come,
Obsequious when abroad, though proud at home; 440
Nor can he much affect the neighb'ring peer,
Whose toe of emulation treads too near;
But wisely seeks a more convenient friend
With whom, dismissing forms, he may unbend ;
A man, whom marks of condescending grace
Teach, while they flatter him, his proper place;
Who comes when call'd, and at a word withdraws,
Speaks with reserve, and listens with applause;
Some plain mechanick, who, without pretence
To birth or wit, nor gives nor takes offence;
On whom he rests well pleas'd his weary pow'rs,
And talks and laughs away his vacant hours.
The tide of life, swift always in its course,
May run in cities with a brisker force,
But no where with a current so serene,

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Or half so clear, as in the rural scene.

Yet how fallacious is all earthly bliss,

What obvious truths the wisest heads may miss;
Some pleasures live a month, and some a year,
But short the date of all we gather here;
No happiness is felt, except the true,

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That does not charm the more for being new.
This observation, as it chanc'd, not made,
Or, if the thought occurr'd not duly weigh'd,
He sighs-for, after all, by slow degrees
The spot he lov'd has lost the pow'r to please;
To cross his ambling pony day by day,
Seems at the best but dreaming life away;
The prospect, such as might enchant despair,
He views it not, or sees no beauty there;
With aching heart, and discontented looks,
Returns at noon to billiards or to books,
But feels, while grasping at his faded joys,
A secret thirst of his renounc'd employs.

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