With gorgeous Tapestries of pictur'd joys?`
Joy behind joy, in endless perspective!

Till at Death's Toll, whofe reftlefs Iron tongue

Calls daily for his Millions at a meal,
Starting I woke, and found myself undone.
Where now my Frenzy's pompous Furniture?
The cobweb'd Cottage with its ragged wall
Of mould'ring Mud, is Royalty to me!
The Spider's most attenuated Thread

Is Cord, is Cable, to man's tender Tie

On earthly Bliss; it breaks at every Breeze,

ye blest scenes of permanent Delight! Full, above measure! lafting, beyond bound! A Perpetuity of Bliss, is Bliss.

Could you, fo rich in rapture, fear an End,
That ghaftly Thought would drink up all

your Joy, And quite unparadife the realms of Light, Safe are you lodg❜d above these rowling Spheres;

The baleful influence of whofe giddy Dance;

Sheds fad Viciffitude on all beneath.

Here teems with Revolutions every Hour;

And rarely for the better; or the best,

More mortal than the common births of Fate.

Each Moment has its Sickle, emulous

Of Time's enormous Scythe, whofe ample Sweep
Strikes Empires from the root; each Moment plays
His little weapon in the narrower fphere

Of fweet domestick Comfort, and cuts down
The faireft bloom of fublunary Blifs.

Blifs! fublunary Blifs! proud words! and vain: Implicit Treafon to divine Decree !

A bold invafion of the rights of Heaven!

I clafp'd the Phantoms, and I found them Air.
O had I weigh'd it e'er my fond Embrace!
What darts of Agony had mifs'd my heart?
Death! Great Proprietor of all! 'tis thine

Tq

To tread out Empire, and to quench the Stars;
The Sun himself by thy permiffion fhines;

And, one day, thou shalt pluck him from his sphere. Amid fuch mighty plunder, why exhaust

Thy partial Quiver on a mark fo mean?

Why, thy peculiar Rancor wreck'd on me?

Infatiate Archer! could not One fuffice?

Thy shaft flew thrice; and thrice my peace was flain;
And thrice, e'er thrice yon Moon had fill'd her Horn:
O Cynthia! why fo pale? Doft thou lament
Thy wretched Neighbour? Grieve, to see thy wheel
Of ceaseless change outwhirl'd in human Life?
How wanes my borrow'd blifs? from Fortune's fmile,
Precarious Courtesy! not Virtue's fure,
Self-given, folar, ray of found Delight.

In every vary'd Pofture, Place, and Hour, How widow'd every Thought of every Joy! Thought, bufy Thought! too bufy for my Peace!

Thro' the dark Postern of Time long elaps'd,

Led foftly, by the stillness of the Night,

Led, like a Murderer, (and fuch it proves!)

Strays, wretched Rover! o'er the pleafing Paft;
In queft of wretchedness perversely strays;

And finds all Defart now; and meets the Ghofts
Of my departed Joys, a numerous Train!
I rue the Riches of my former Fate ;
Sweet Comfort's blafted Clufters I lament;

I tremble at the Bleffings once fo dear;
And every Pleasure pains me to the Heart.
Yet why complain? or why complain for One?
Hangs out the Sun his Luftre but for Me?
The fingle Man? are Angels all befide?

I mourn for Millions; 'tis the common Lot;
In this shape, or in that, has Fate entail'd
The Mother's throes on all of woman born,

Not more the Children, than fure Heirs of Pain.

Was

War, Famine, Peft, Volcano, Storm, and Fire, Inteftine Broils, Oppreffion, with her heart

Wrapt up in tripple Brafs, befiege mankind :

God's Image, difinherited of Day,

Here, plung'd in Mines, forgets a Sun was made;
There, Beings deathless as their haughty Lord,
Are hammer'd to the galling Oar for life;
And plough the Winter's wave, and reap Despair:
Some, for hard Masters, broken under Arms,
In battle lopt away, with half their limbs,
Beg bitter bread thro' realms their Valour fav'd,
If fo the Tyrant, or his Minion, doom:
Want, and incurable Disease, (fell Pair!)
On hopeless Multitudes remorfelefs feize

At once; and make a Refuge of the Grave:
How groaning Hofpitals eject their Dead?
What numbers groan for fad Admiffion there?
What numbers once in Fortune's lap high-fed,

Sollicit