Yes! there are hearts, prophetic hope may truft,
That flumber yet in uncreated duft,
Ordain'd to fire th' adoring fons of earth
With every charm of wisdom and of worth;
Ordain'd to light, with intellectual day,
The mazy wheels of nature as they play,
Or, warm with Fancy's energy, to glow,
And rival all but Shakipeare's name below!
The HOPES of Love; from the fame Poem.
HO that would ask a heart to dulnefs wed,
The waveless calm, the slumber of the dead?
No; the wild blifs of nature needs alloy,
And fear and forrow fan the fire of joy!
And fay, without our hopes, without our fears,
Without the home that plighted love endears,
Without the fmile from partial beauty won,
Oh! what were man ?—a world without a fun !
Till Hymen brought his love-delighted hour,
There dwelt no joy in Eden's rofy bow'r!
In vain the viewlefs feraph ling'ring there,
At ftarry midnight, charm'd the filent air;
In vain the wild-bird carol'd on the steep,
To hail the fun, flow-wheeling from the deep;
In vain, to foothe the folitary fhade,
Aerial notes in mingling measure play'd;
The fummer wind that hook the fpangled tree,
The whispering wave, the murmur of the bee-
Still flowly pafs'd the melancholy day,
And ftill the ftranger wift not where to ftray-
The world was fad!-the garden was a wild!-
And man, the hermit, figh'd-till woman fmil'd!
True! the fad power to generous hearts may bring
Delirious anguifh on his fiery wing!
Barr'd from delight by Fate's untimely hand,
By wealthlefs lot, or pitilefs command:
Or doom'd to gaze on beauties that adorn
The Imile of triumph, or the frown of scorn;
While memory watches o'er the fad review
Of joys that faded like the morning dew;
Peace may depart-and life and nature feem
A barren patha wildnefs, and a dream!
VOL. XLI.
But, can the noble mind for ever brood,
The willing victim of a weary mood,
On heartless cares that fquander life away,
And cloud young genius bright'ning into day!-
Shame to the coward thought that e'er betray'd
The noon of manhood to a myrtle shade !—
If hope's creative fpirit cannot raise
One trophy facred to thy future days,
Scorn the dull crowd that haunt the gloomy fhrine
Of hopeless love, to murmur and repine!
But, fhould a figh of milder mood exprefs
Thy heart-warm wishes true to happiness,
Should heav'n's fair harbinger delight to pour
Her blissful vifions on thy penfive hour,
No tear to blot thy memory's pictur'd page,
No fears but fuch as fancy can affuage;
Though thy wild heart fome haplefs hour may mifs
The peaceful tenor of unvaried blifs,
(For love purfues an ever devious race,
True to the winding lineaments of grace);
Yet ftill may hope her talifman employ
To fnatch from heaven anticipated joy,
And all her kindred energies impart
That burn the brightest in the pureft heart!
Apoftrophe to the Poets of the Age. From the ANTIJACOBIN Newspaper.
UT fay,-indignant does the mufe retire,
No pious hand to feed the facred flame,
No raptur'd foul a poet's charge to claim?
Bethink thee, Gifford, when fome future age
Shall trace the promise of thy playful page;
*The hand which bruth'd a fwarm of fools away
Should roufe to grafp a more reluctant prey!'
Think then, will pleaded indolence excufe
The tame feceflion of thy languid mufe?
Ah! where is now that promife? why fo long
Sleep the keen fhafts of fatire and of fong?
Oh! come, with taste and virtue at thy fide,
With ardent zeal inflam'd, and patriot pride;
With keen poetic glance direct the blow,
And empty all thy quiver on the foc :---
* See the motto prefixed to "The Baviad," a poem, by W. Gifford, efq.
No paufe-no reft-'till weltering on the ground
The poifonous hydra lies, and pierc'd with many a wound.
Thou too!-the *nameless Bard, whofe honeft zeal
For law, for morals, for the public weal,
Pours down impetuous on thy country's foes
The ftream of verfe, and many languaged profe;
Thou too!-though oft thy ill-advis'd diflike
The guiltless head with random cenfure ftrike,-
Though quaint allufions, vague and undefin'd,
Play faintly round the ear, but mock the mind;
Through the mix'd mafs yet truth and learning fhine,
And manly vigour ftamps the nervous line;
And patriot warmth the generous rage infpires,
And wakes and points the defultory fires!
Yet more remain unknown:-for who can tell
What bathful genius, in fome rural cell,
year to year, and day fuccceds to day,
In joylels leifure waftes his life away?
In him the flame of early fancy fhone;
His genuine worth his old companions own;
In childhood and in youth their chief confefs'd,
His mafter's pride, his pattern to the reft, t
Now, far aloof retiring from the strife
Of bufy talents, and of active life,
As, from the loop-holes of retreat, he views
Our stage, verfe, pamphlets, politics, and news
He loaths the world, or with reflection fad
Concludes it irrecoverably mad;
Of tafte, of learning, morals, all bereft,
No hope, no profpect, to redeem it left.
Awake! for fhame! or e'er thy nobler sense
Sink in th' oblivious pool of indolence!
Muft wit be found alone on Falfehood's fide,
Unknown to Truth, to Virtue unallied?
Arife nor fcorn thy country's juft alarms;
Wield in her caufe thy long-neglected arms:
Of lofty fatire pour th' indignant ftrain,
Leagued with her friends, and ardent to maintain,
'Gainft Learning's, Virtue's, Truth's, Religion's foes,"
A kingdom's fafety, and the world's repofe.
If vice appal thee, if thou view with awe
Infults that brave, and crimes that 'fcape the law;
Yet may
the fpecious baftard brood, which claim
A fpurious homage under Virtue's name,
Author of "Purfuits of Literature."
Some particular perfon is evidently here alluded to.
Sprung from that parent of ten thousand crimes,
The new philofophy of modern times;
Yet, thefe may reufe thee!-with unfparing hand
Oh, lafh the vile impoftures from the land!"
Firft, ftern philanthropy:-not fhe, who dries
The orphan's tears, and wipes the widow's eyes;
Not fhe, who, fainted charity her guide,
Of British bounty pours the annual tide :-
But French philanthropy ;-whose boundless mind
Glows with the general love of all mankind;-
Philanthropy, beneath whose baneful fway
Each patriot paffion finks, and dies away.
Taught in her fchool t' imbibe the mawkifh ftrain,
Condorcet, filter'd through the dregs of Paine,
Each pert adept difowns a Briton's part,
And plucks the name of England from his heart.
What, fhall a name, a word, a found controu!
Th' afpiring thought, and cramp th' expanfive foul?
Shall one half-peopled ifland's rocky round
A love, that glows for all creation, bound?
And focial charities contract the plan
Fram'd for thy freedom, universal man?
-No-through th" extended globe his feelings run,
As broad and general as th' unbounded fun!
No narrow bigot he;-his reafon'd view
Thy interefts, England, ranks with thine, Peru!
France, at our doors, he fees no danger nigh,
But heaves for Turkey's woes th' impartial figh;
A fteady patriot of the world alone,
The friend of every country-but his own.
Next comes a gentler virtue-Ah! beware
Left the harsh verle her fhrinking softness scare.
Vifit her not too roughly; the warm figh
Breaths on her lips; the tear-drop gems
her eye.
Sweet fenfibility, who dwells enthrin'd
In the fine foldings of the feeling mind;
With delicate Mimofa's fenfe endu'd,
Who fhrinks inftinctive from a hand too rude ;-
Or, like the Anagallis, prefcient flow'r,
Shuts her foft petals at th' approaching fhow'r,
Sweet child of fickly Fancy!-her of yore
From her lov'd France Rouffeau to exile bore;
And, while 'midst lakes and mountains wild he ran,
Full of himself, and fhunn'd the haunts of man,
Taught her, o'er each lone vale and Alpine fteep,
To lifp the ftory of his wrongs, and weep ;
Taught her to cherish ftill in either eye,
Of tender tears a plentiful fupply,
And pour them in the brooks that babbled by ;-
Taught by nice fcale to meet her feelings ftrong,
Falfe by degrees, and exquifitely wrong;
For the crush'd beetle, first-the widow'd dove,
And all the warbled forrows of the grove;
Next for poor fuffering guilt and, last of all,
For parents, friends, a king and country's fall.
Mark her fair votaries, prodigal of grief,
With curelefs pangs, and woes that mock relief,
Droop in foft forrow o'er a faded flow'r ;
O'er a dead jack-afs pour the pearly fhow'r:
But hear, unmov'd, of Loire's enfanguin'd flood,
Choak'd up with flain;-of Lyons drench'd in blood;
Of crimes that blot the age, the world with flame,
Foul crimes, but ficklied o'er with Freedom's name;
Altars and thrones fubverted, focial life
Trampled to earth, the husband from the wife,
Parent from child, with ruthless fury torn,
Of talents, honour, virtue, wit, forlorn,
In friendless exile, of the wife and good
Staining the daily fcaffold with their blood-
Of favage cruelties, that fcare the mind,
The rage of madnefs with hell's lufts combin'd-
Of hearts torn reeking from the mangled breaft,
They hear and hope, that all is for the best.
SIMPLICITY, or the CURATE; from Peter Pindar's Nil Admirari, or a Smile at a Bishop.
How difficult, alas! to please mankind!
One or the other every moment mutters:
This wants an eaftern, that a western wind;
A third, petition for a fouthern, utters.
Some pray for rain, and fome for frost and snow:
How can heav'n fuit all palates ?--I don't know.
Good Lamb, the curate, much approv'd,
Indeed by all his flock belov'd,
Was one dry fummer begg'd to pray for rain:
The parfon moft devoutly pray'd—
The pow'rs of pray'r were foon difplay'd;
Immediately a torrent drench'd the plain.
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