Satyrs and fylvan boys were seen,
Peeping from forth their alleys green;
Brown Exercife rejoic'd to hear,
Fair Fancy wept; and echoing fighs confefs'd
A fixt defpair in every tuneful breast.
Not with more grief th' afflicted fwains appear,
And Sport leapt up, and feiz'd his beechen fpear. When wintery winds deform the plenteous year;
Laft came Joy's ecftatic trial,
He, with viny crown advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand addrest, But foon he faw the brifk-awakening viol,
Whose sweet entrancing voice he lov'd the heft,
They would have thought, who heard the
ftrain,
They faw in Tempe's vale her native maids,
Amidst the feftal founding fhades,
To fome unwearied minstrel dancing,
While, as his flying fingers kifs'd the ftrings,
Love fram'd with Mirth a gay fantastic round,
Loofe were her treffes feen, her zone unbound,
And he, amidst his frolic play,
As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings.
O Mufic, fphere-defcended maid,
Friend of pleasure, wifdom's aid,
Why, Goddefs, why to us denied?
Lay'st thou thy ancient lyre afide?
As in that lov'd Athenian bower,
You learn'd an all-commanding power,
Thy mimic foul, O nymph endear'd,
Can well recal what then it heard.
Where is thy native fimple heart,
Devote to virtue, fancy, art?
Arife, as in that elder time,
Warm, energetic, chafte, fublime!
Thy wonders, in that god-like age,
Fill thy recording fifter's page-
Tis faid, and I believe the tale,
Thy humbleft reed could more prevail,
Had more of ftrength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age,
Ev'n all at once together found
Cæcilia's mingled world of found-
O, bid our vain endeavours cease,
Receive the juft designs of Greece,
Return in all thy fimple state!
Confirm the tales her fons relate!
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When lingering frofts the ruin'd feats invade
Where Peace reforted, and the Graces play'd.
Each rifing art by just gradation moves,
Toil builds on toil, and age on age improves :
The Mufe alone unequal dealt her rage,
And grac'd with noblett pomp her earliest stage.
Preferv'd through time, the speaking scenes impart
Each changeful wifh of Phædra's tortur'd heart:
Or paint the curfe that mark'd the
A bed incestuous, and a father flain.
With kind concern our pitying eyes o'erflow,
Trace the fad tale, and own another's woe.
To Rome remov'd, with wit fecure to please,
The comic fifters keep their native cafe.
With jealous fear declining Greece bebeld
Her own Menander's art almost excell'd!
But every Mufe effay'd to raise in vain
Some labour'd rival of her tragic strain ;
Ilyffus' laurels, though transferr'd with tol,
Drop'd their fair leaves, nor knew th' unfriendly
fo.l
As arts expir'd, refiftlefs Dulness rofe;
Goths, Priefts, or Vandals,-all were learning's
Till Julius first recall'd each exil'd maid, "
And Cofmo own'd them in th' Etrurian fade:
Then, deeply kill'd in love's engaging theme,
The foft Provencial país'd to Arno's stream:
With graceful ease the wanton lyre he strung,
Sweet flow'd the lays-but love was all he fung.
The gay defcription could not fail to move;
For, led by nature, all are friends to love.
But heaven, ftill various in its works, decreed
The perfect boast of time should last succeed.
The beauteous union must appear at length,
Of Tuican fancy, and Athenian strength :
One greater Mufe Eliza's reign adorn,
And ev❜n a Shakespear to her fame be born!
Yet, ah! fo bright her morning's opening ray, In vain our Britain hop'd an equal day! No fecond growth the western ifle could bear, At once exhausted with too rich a year. Too nicely Jonfon knew the critic's part; Nature in him was almost loft in Art. Of fofter mould the gentle Fletcher came, The next in order, as the next in name.
Addreffed to Sir Thomas Hanmer, on his Edition With pleas'd attention 'midft his scenes we find
Each glowing thought, that warms the female mind;
HILE, born to bring the Mufe's happier Each melting figh, and every tender tear,
A patriot's hand protects a poet's lays ;
The lover's wifhes, and the virgin's fear.
His every ftrain the Smiles and Graces own;
While, nurs'd by you, the fees her myrtles bloom, But ftronger Shakespeare felt for man alone:
Green and unwither'd o'er his honour'd tomb:
Excufe her doubts, if yet fhe fears to tell
What fecret transports in her bofom fwell:
With confcious awe fhe hears the critic's fame,
And blushing hides her wreath at Shakespeare's
Hard was the lot those injur'd strains endur'd, Unown'd by science, and by years obfcur'd:
Drawn by his pen, our ruder paffions stand Th' unrival'd picture of his early hand.
The Oedipus of Sophocles.
Julius II. the immediate predeceffor of Leo X. Their characters are thus diftinguished by Mr. Dryden.
* With gradual teps, and flow, exacter France
Saw Art's fair empire o'er her fhores advance:
By length of toil a bright perfection knew,
Correctly bold, and juft in all she drew.
Till late Corneille, with † Lucan's spirit fir'd
Breath'd the free ftrain, as Rome and he infpir'd:
And claffic judgment gain'd to fweet Racine
The temperate ftrength of Maro's chafter line.
But wilder far the British laurel spread,
And wreaths lefs artful crown our poet's head.
Yet he alone to every fcene could give
Th' hiftorian's truth, and bid the manners live.
Wak'd at his call Iview, with glad furprize,
Majestic forms of mighty monarchs rife.
There Henry's trumpets spread their loud alarms,
And laurel'd Conquest waits her hero's arms.
Her gentler Edward claims a pitying figh,
Scarce born to honours, and fo foon to die!
Yet fhall thy throne, unhappy infant, bring
No beam of comfort to the guilty king:
The time hall come when Glo'fter's heart fhall
bleed
In life's last hours, with horror of the deed:
When dreary vifions fhail at laft present
The vengeful image in the midnight tent:
Thy hand unfeen the fecret death fhall bear,
Blunt the weak fword, and break th' oppreffive
spear.
Wheree'er we turn, by fancy charm'd, we find
Some sweet illufions of the cheated mind.
Oft, wild of wing, the calls the foul to rove
With humbler nature, in the rural grove ;
Where twains contented own the quiet scene,
And twilight fairies tread the circled green:
Drefs'd by her hand, the woods and vallies fimile,
And Spring diffufive decks th' inchanted ifle.
O, more than all in powerful genius bleft,
Come, take thine empire o'er the willing breast!
Whate'er the wounds this youthful heart shall feel,
Thy fongs fupport me, and thy morals heal!
There every thought the poet's warmth may raise,
Their native mufic dwells in all the lays.
O, might fome verfe with happiest skill perfuade
Expretive Picture to adopt thine aid!
What wondrous draughts might rife from every
page!
What other Raphael charm a diftant age!
Methinks ev'n now I view fome free defign,
Where breathing Nature lives in every line:
Chafte and fubdued the modest lights decay,
Steal into fhades, and mildly melt away.
-And fee, where I Anthony, in tears approv'd,
Guards the pale relies of the chief he lov'd:
O'er the cold confe the warrior feems to bend,
Deep funk in grief, and mourns his murder'd friend!
Still as they prefs, he cails on all around,
Lifts the torn robe, and points the bleeding wound.
* About the time of Shakespeare, the poet Hardy
He wrote, accord-
was in great repute in France.
ing to Fontenelle, fix hundred plays. The French
poets after him applied themselves in general to the
corre a improvement of the Rage, which was almoft
totally difregarded by thofe of our own country,
Janton excepted.
The favourite author of the elder Corneille.
See the tragedy of Julius Cæfar.
But who is he, whofe brows exalted bear
A wrath impatient, and a fiercer air?
Awake to all that injur'd worth can feel,
On his own Rome he turns th' avenging steel.
Yet fhall not war's infatiate fury fall,
(So heaven ordains it) on the deftin'd wall.
See the fond mother, 'midft the plaintive train,
Hung on his knees, and proftrate on the plain!
Touch'd to the foul, in vain he ftrives to hide
The fon's affection, in the Roman's pride:
O'er all the man conflicting paffions rife,
Rage grafps the fword, while pity melts the eyes.
Thus, generous Critic, as thy bard inspires,
The Sifter Arts fhall nurfe their drooping fires:
Each from his fcenes her ftores alternate bring,
Blend the fair tints, or wake the vocal ftring:
Thofe Sibyl-leaves, the sport of every wind,
(For poets ever were a careless kind)
By thee difpos'd, no farther toil demand,
But, just to nature, own thy forming hand.
So fpread o'er Greece, th' harmonious whole un-
known,
Ev'n Homer's numbers charm'd by parts alone.
Their own Ulyffes fcarce had wander'd more,
By winds and waters caft on every shore :
When rais'd by fate, fome former Hanmer join'd
Each beautcous image of the boundless mind;
And bade, like thee, his Athens ever claim
A fond alliance with the Poet's name.
DIRGE IN CYMBELINE,
Sung by Guiderius and Arviragus over Fidele, fuppofed to be dead.
No wither'd witch fhall here be seen,
No goblins lead their nightly crew;
The female fays fhall haunt the green,
And drefs thy grave with pearly dew;
The red-breast oft at evening hours
Shall kindly lend his little aid,
With hoary mofs, and gather'd flowers,
To deck the ground where thou art laid.
When howling winds, and beating rain,
In tempefts shake thy fylvan cell;
Or 'midit the chace on every plain,
The tender thought on thee fhall dwell.
* Coriolanus. See Mr. Spence's dialogue on the Odyffey.
But thou, who own'st that earthly bed,
Ah! what will every dirge avail?
Or tears, which Love and Pity fhed
That mourn beneath the gliding fail!
VII.
Yet lives there one, whofe heedlefs eye
Shall fcorn thy pale fhrine glimmering near? With him, fweet bard, may Fancy die,
And joy defert the blooming year.
VIII.
But thou, lorn stream, whose sullen tide
No fedge-crown'd fifters now attend,
Now waft me from the green hill's fide
Whofe cold turf hides the buried friend!
IX.
And fee, the fairy vallies fade,
Dun night has veil'd the folemn view!
Yet once again, dear parted fhade,
Meek nature's child, again adieu !
The harp of Æolus, of which fee a defcription in the Caftle of Indolence.
Mr. Thomson was buried in Richmond church.
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With virtue's are forbear the facred prize,
Nor dare a theft for love and pity's fake!
This precious relick, form'd by magic power,
Beneath the fhepherd's haunted pillow laid,
Was meant by love to charm the filent hour,
The fecret prefent of a matchless maid.
The Cyprian queen, at Hymen's fond request,
Each nice ingredient chose with happiest art;
Fears, fighs, and wishes of th' enamour'd breast,
And pains that please are mixt in every part.
With rofy hand the fpicy fruit fhe brought,
From Paphian hills, and fair Cytherea's ife;
And temper'd fweet with these the melting thought,
The kifs ambrofial, and the yielding fmile.
Ambiguous looks, that scorn and yet relent,
Denials mild, and firm unalter'd truth,
Reluctant pride, and amorous faint confent,
And meeting ardours, and exulting youth.
Sleep, wayward God! hath fworn, while thefe remain,
With flattering dreams to dry his nightly tear,
And chearful hope, fo oft invok'd in vain,
With fairy fongs fhall footh his penfive ear.
If, bound by vows to friendship's gentle fide,
And fond of foul, thou hop'it an equal grace,
If youth or maid thy joys and griefs divide,
Ó, much intreated leave this fatal place.
Sweet Peace, who long hath fhunn'd my plaintive
day,
Confents at length to bring me fhort delight,
Thy careless steps may fcare her doves away,
And Grief with raven note ufurp the night.
* Mr. Thomson refided in the neighbourhood of Richmond fome time before his death.
Have feen thee lingering with a fond delay,
Mid those foft friends, whofe hearts fome future day,
Shall melt, perhaps, to hear thy tragic fong
Go, not unmindful of that cordial youth †
Whom, long endear'd, thou leav'ft by Lavant's fide;
Together let us wifh him lafting truth,
And joy untainted with his deftin'd bride.
Go! nor regar. lefs, while thefe numbers boast
My fhort-liv'd blifs, forget my focial name;
But think, far off, how, on the fouthern coaft,
I met thy friendship with an equal flame!
Fresh to that foil thou turn'ft, where every vale
Shall prompt the poet, and his fong demand:
To thee thy copious fubjects ne'er shall fail;
Thou need'it but take thy pencil to thy hand,
And paint what all believe, who own thy genial
There, must thou wake perforce thy Doric quill;
'Tis Fancy's land to which thou fett'ft thy feet;
Where still, 'tis faid, the fairy people meet,
Beneath each birken fhade, on mead or hill.
There, each trim lafs, that skims the milky store
To the fwart tribes, their creamy bowls allots;
By night they fip it round the cottage-door,
While airy minstrels warble jocund notes.
There, every herd, by fad experience, knows
How, wing'd with Fate, their elf-shot arrows
fly,
When the fick ewe her fummer food foregoes,
Or, ftretch'd on earth, the heart-fmit heifers lie.
Such airy beings awe th' untutor'd swain :
Nor thou, tho' learn'd, his homelier thoughts
neglect;
Let thy fwect Mufe the rural faith fuftain;
Thefe are the themes of fimple, fure effect, That add new conqueft to her boundless reign, And fill, with double force, her heart-commanding frain.
Ev'n yet preferv'd, how often may'st thou hear, Where to the pole the Boreal mountains run, Taught by the father, to his liftening fon; Strange lays, whof: power had charm'd a Spenfer's
How truly did Collins predict Home's tragic powers!
A Gentleman of the name of Barrow, who introduced Home to Collins.
'Tis thine to fing, how, framing hideous spells,
In Sky's lone ifle, the gifted wizzard-feer,
Lodg'd in the wintery cave with Fate's fell fpear,
Or in the depth of Uift's dark foreft dwells:
How they, whofe fight fuch dreary dreams engrofs,
With their own vifion oft astonish'd droop,
When, o'er the watry ftrath, or quaggy mofs They fee the gliding ghosts unbodied troop.
Or, if in fports, or in the feftive green, Their deftin'd glance fome fated youth defcry, Who now, perhaps, in lufty vigour feen, And rofy health, fhall foon lamented die.
For them the viewlefs forms of air obey;
Their bidding heed, and at their beck repair.
They know what spirit brews the ftormful day, And heartless, oft, like moody madness, ftare To fee the phantom train their fecret work prepare.
To monarchs deart, fome hundred miles aftray,
Oft have they feen Fate give the fatal blow!
The Seer, in Sky, fhriek'd as the blood did flow, When headless Charles warm on the scaffold lay!
* A fummer hut, built in the high part of the mountains, to tend their flocks in the warm season, when the pasture is fine.
By the public prints we are informed, that a Scotch clergyman lately difcovered Collin's rude draught of this poem. It is however faid to be very imperfect. The Vth ftanza, and the half of the VIth, fay thofe prints, being deficient, has been fupplied by Mr. Mackenzie; whofe lines are here annexed, for the purpose of comparison, and to do justice to the elegant author of the Man of Feeling. "Or on fome bellying rock that fhades the deep, "They view the lurid figns that cross the fky, "Where in the west, the brooding tempests
"And here their first, faint, rustling pennons fweep.
"Or in the arched cave, where deep and dark "The broad, unbroken billows heave and fwell,
"In horrid mufings rapt, they fit to mark "The lab'ring moon; or lift the nightly
As Boreas threw his young Aurora * forth,
In the first year of the firft George's reign,
And battles rag'd in welkin of the North,
They mourn'd in air, fell, fell Rebellion flain!
And as, of late, they joyn'd in Preston's fight,
Saw at fad Falkirk, all their hopes near crown'd!
They rav'd! divining, thro' their Second Sight †,
Pale, red Culloden, where these hopes were
drown'd!
Illuftrious William ! Britain's guardian name!
One William fav'd us from a tyrant's stroke;
He, for a fceptre, gain'd heroic fame,
But thou, more glorious, flavery's chain haft
broke,
To reign a private man, and bow to Freedom's yoke!
Thefe too, thou'lt fing! for well thy magic Muse
Can to the topmost heaven of grandeur foar;
Or ftoop to wail the fwain that is no more!
Ah, homely fwains! your homeward fteps ne'er
1ofe;
Let not dank Will § mislead you to the heath:
Dancing in murky night, o'er fen and lake,
He glows, to draw you downward to your death, In his bewitch'd, low, marthy, willow brake !
،، Of that dreas fpirit, whole gigantic form
،، The feer's entranced eye can well furvey, "Through the dim air who guides the driving storm,
"And points the wretched bark its deftin'd
prey.
"Or him who hovers on his flagging wing,
"O'er the dire whirlpool, that, in ocean's
wafte,
e Draws intant down whate'er devoted thing
"The falling breeze within its reach hath
plac'd
"The diftant feaman hears, and flies with
trembling hafte,
"Or, if on land the fiend exerts his sway, "Silent he broods o'er quickfand, bog or ten, "Far from the sheltering roof and haunts of
"When witched darkness fhuts the eye of day,
"And throuds each ftar that wont to cheer the
night;
"Or, if the drifted fnow perplex the way,
"With treacherous gleam he lures the fated
wight,
"And leads him floundering on and quite aftray."
* By young Aurora, Collins undoubtedly meant the first appearance of the northern lights, which happened about the year 1715; at leaft, it is moft highly probable from this peculiar circumstance, that no ancient writer whatever has taken any notice of them, nor even any one modern, previous to the above period.
+ Second fight is the term that is ufed for the divination of the Highlanders.
The late Duke of Cumberland, who defeated the Pretender at the battle of Culloden.
A fiery meteor, called by various names, fuch as Will with the Wifp, Jack with the Lanthorn, &c. It hovers in the air over marthy and fenny placesVOL. VII.
What though far off, from fome dark dell efpied,
His glimmering mazes chear th' excurfive fight,
Yet turn, ye wanderers, turn your fteps afide,
Nor truft the guidance of that faithless light;
For watchful, lurking, 'mid th' unruftling reed,
At thofe mirk hours the wily monster lies,
And liftens oft to hear the paffing steed,
And frequent round him rolls his fullen eyes,
If chance his favage wrath may fome weak wretch
furprize.
Ah, luckless fwain, o'er all unblest, indeed!
Whom late bewilder'd in the dank, dark fen,
Far from his flocks, and fir.oalking hamlet, then !
To that fad fpot where hums the fedgy weed :
On him, enrag'd, the fiend, in angry mood,
Shall never look with pity's kind concern,
But inftant, furious, raife the whelming flood
O'er its drown'd banks, forbidding all return!
Or, if he meditate his wifh'd efcape,
To fome dim hill that feems uprising near,
To his faint eye, the grim and grifly shape,
In all its terrors clad, fhall wild appear.
Meantime the watery furge fhall round him rife,
Pour'd fudden forth from every fwelling fource!
What now remains but tears and hopeless fighs? His fear-fhook limbs have loft their youthly force, And down the waves he floats, a pale and breathlefs corfe!
For him in vain his anxious wife shall wait,
Or wander forth to meet him on his way;
For him in vain at to-fall of the day,
His babes fhall linger at th' unclosing gate!
Ah, ne'er fhall he return! Alone, if night,
Her travel'd limbs in broken flumbers steep!
With drooping willows dreft, his mournful sprite
Shall vifit fad, perchance, her filent fleep:
Then he, perhaps, with moift and watery hand,
Shall fondly feem to prefs her fhuddering cheek, And with his blue-fwoln face before her ftand,
And thivering cold, thefe piteous accents speak: "Purfue, dear wife, thy daily to is, purfue,
"At dawn or dusk, industrious as before; "Nor e'er of me one helpless thought renew, "While I lie weltering on the ozier'd thore, "Drown'd by the Kelpie's wrath, nor e'er shall aid thee more!"
Unbounded is thy range; with varied skill
Thy Mufe may, like thofe feathery tribes which fpring
From their rude rocks, extend her skirting wing Round the most marge of each cold Hebrid ifle,
To that hoar pile † which still its ruin shows: In whofe fmall vaults a pigmy-folk is found,
Whofe bones the delver with his fpade upthrows, And culls them, wond'ring, from the hallow'd ground!
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