LET brutes and vegetals, that cannot think,
So far as drought and nature urges, drink;
A more indulgent mistress guides our sp❜rites,
Reason, that dares beyond our appetites :
She would our care as well as thirst redress,
And with divinity rewards excess.
Deserted Ariadne, thus supplied,
Did perjured Theseus' cruelty deride:
Bacchus embraced, from her exalted thought
Banish'd the man, her passion, and his fault.
Bacchus and Phoebus are by Jove allied,
And each by other's timely heat supplied:
All that the grapes owe to his ripening fires
Is paid in numbers which their juice inspires.
Wine fills the veins, and healths are understood
To give our friends a title to our blood:
Who, naming me, doth warm his courage so,
Shows for my sake what his bold hand would do.
PLAYING ON THE LUTE.
SUCH moving sounds from such a careless touch!
So unconcern'd herself, and we so much!
What art is this, that with so little pains
Transports us thus, and o'er our spirits reigns?
The trembling strings about her fingers crowd,
And tell their joy for every kiss aloud.
Small force there needs to make them tremble so;
Touch'd by that hand, who would not tremble too?
Here Love takes stand, and while she charms the
Empties his quiver on the listening deer.
Music so softens and disarms the mind,
That not an arrow does resistance find.
Thus the fair tyrant celebrates the prize,
And acts herself the triumph of her eyes:
So Nero once, with harp in hand, survey'd
His flaming Rome, and as it burn'd he play'd.
OF MRS. ARDEN.
BEHOLD, and listen, while the fair
Breaks in sweet sounds the willing air,
And with her own breath fans the fire
Which her bright eyes do first inspire.
What reason can that love control,
Which more than one way courts the soul?
So when a flash of lightning falls
On our abodes, the danger calls
For human aid, which hopes the flame
To conquer, though from Heaven it came ;
But if the winds with that conspire,
Men strive not, but deplore the fire.
MARRIAGE OF THE DWARFS.
DESIGN or Chance makes others wive,
But Nature did this match contrive:
Eve might as well have Adam fled,
As she denied her little bed
To him, for whom Heaven seem'd to frame
And measure out this only dame.
Thrice happy is that humble pair,
Beneath the level of all care!
Over whose heads those arrows fly
Of sad distrust and jealousy ;
Secured in as high extreme,
As if the world held none but them.
To him the fairest nymphs do show
Like moving mountains top'd with snow;
And every man a Polypheme
Does to his Galatea seem:
None may presume her faith to prove;
He proffers death that proffers love.
Ah, Chloris! that kind Nature thus
From all the world had sever'd us;
Creating for ourselves us two,
As Love has me for only you!
LOVE'S FAREWELL.
TREADING the path to nobler ends,
A long farewell to love I gave;
Resolved my country and my friends
All that remain'd of me should have.
And this resolve no mortal dame,
None but those eyes could have o'erthrown ; The nymph I dare not, need not name,
So high, so like herself alone.
Thus the tall oak, which now aspires
Above the fear of private fires,
Grown and design'd for nobler use,
Not to make warm, but build the house,
Though from our meaner flames secure,
Must that which falls from Heaven endure.
FROM A CHILD.
some climes the warmer sun ere the spring's begun, ding boughs can load, ad;
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