Of mimic fancy and harmonious joy,
To priestly domination and the luft
Of lawless courts, their amiable toil
For three inglorious ages have refign'd,
In vain reluctant: and Torquato's tongue
Was tun'd for flavish pæans at the throne
Of tinfel pomp and Raphael's magic hand
Effus'd its fair creation to enchant
The fond adoring herd in Latian fanes
To blind belief; while on their proftrate necks 40
The fable tyrant plants his heel fecure.
But now, behold! the radiant æra dawns,
When freedom's ample fabric, fix'd at length
For endless years on Albion's happy shore
In full proportion, once more shall extend
To all the kindred powers of social blifs
A common mansion, a parental roof.
There shall the Virtues, there fhall Wisdom's train,
Their long-loft friends rejoining, as of old,
Embrace the fmiling family of arts,
The Mufes and the Graces. Then no more
Shall Vice, distracting their delicious gifts
To aims abhorr'd, with high diftafte and scorn
Turn from their charms the philofophic eye,
The patriot-bofom; then no more the paths
Of public care or intellectual toil,
Alone by footsteps haughty and severe
In gloomy state be trod; the harmonious Mule
And her perfuafive fifters then fhall plant
Their fheltering laurels o'er the bleak ascent,
And scatter flowers along the rugged way.
Arm'd with the lyre, already have we dar'd
To pierce divine Philosophy's retreats,
And teach the Muse her lore; already strove
Their long-divided honours to unite,
While tempering this deep argument we fang
Of Truth and Beauty. Now the same glad task
Impends; now urging our ambitious toil,
We haften to recount the various springs
Of adventitious pleasure, which adjoin
Their grateful influence to the prime effect
Of objects grand or beauteous, and enlarge
The complicated joy. The fweets of sense,
Do they not oft with kind acceffion flow,
To raise harmonious Fancy's native charm?
So while we tafte the fragrance of the rofe,
Glows not her blush the fairer ? While we view
Amid the noon-tide walk a limpid rill
Gufh thro' the trickling herbage, to the thirst
Of fummer yielding the delicious draught
Of cool refreshment; o'er the mossy brink
Shines not the furface clearer, and the waves
With sweeter mufic murmur as they flow?
Nor this alone; the various lot of life
Oft from external circumftance affumes
A moment's difpofition to rejoice
In those delights which at a different hour
Would pass unheeded. Fair the face of spring,
When rural fongs and odours wake the morn,
To every eye; but how much more to his
Round whom the bed of fickness long diffus'd
Its melancholy gloom! how doubly fair,
When first with fresh-born vigour he inhales
The balmy breeze, and feels the bleffed fun
Warm at his bofom, from the fprings of life
Chafing oppreffive damps and languid pain!
Or fhall I mention, where cœleftial Truth 'Her awful light discloses, to bestow
A more majestic pomp on Beauty's frame ?
For man loves knowledge, and the beams of Truth
More welcome touch his understanding's eye,
Than all the blandishments of found his ear,
Than all of tafte his tongue. Nor ever yet
The melting rainbow's vernal-tinctur'd hues
To me have fhone fo pleafing, as when firft 105
The hand of Science pointed out the path
In which the fun-beams gleaming from the west
Fall on the watery cloud, whofe darksome veil
Involves the orient; and that trickling shower
Piercing thro' every crystalline convex
Of clustering dew-drops to their flight oppos'd,
Recoil at length where concave a behind
The internal surface of each glaffy orb
Repels their forward paffage into air;
That thence direct they seek the radiant goal 115
From which their course began; and as they strike
In different lines the gazer's obvious eye,
Affume a different luftre, thro' the braid
Of colours changing from the splendid rose
To the pale violet's dejected hue.
Or shall we touch that kind access of joy, That springs to each fair object, while we trace Thro' all its fabric, Wisdom's artful aim
Difpofing every part, and gaining still
By means proportion'd her benignant end?
Speak, ye, the pure delight, whofe favour'd steps
The lamp of science thro' the jealous maze
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