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False pleasure urged, and ev'ry eager care,
That swell the soul to guilt and to despair.
My Mira came! be ever blest the hour,

That drew my thoughts half way from folly's power;
She first my soul with loftier notions fired;
I saw their truth, and as I saw admired;
With greater force returning reason moved,
And as returning reason urged, I loved;
Till pain, reflection, hope, and love allied
My bliss precarious to a surer guide
To Him who gives pain, reason, hope, and love,
Each for that end that angels must approve.
One beam of light He gave my mind to see,
And gave that light, my heavenly fair, by thee;

That beam shall raise my thoughts, and mend my strain,
Nor shall my vows, nor prayers, nor verse be vain.

HYMN.

Beccles, 1778.

OH, Thou! who taught my infant eye
To pierce the air, and view the sky,
To see my God in earth and seas,
To hear him in the vernal breeze,
To know him midnight thoughts among,
O guide my soul, and aid my song.
Spirit of Light! do thou impart
Majestic truths, and teach my heart;
Teach me to know how weak I am;
How vain my powers, how poor my frame;

Teach me celestial paths untrod -

The ways of glory and of God.

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GIVE me, ye Powers that rule in gentle hearts!
The full design, complete in all its parts,
Th' enthusiastic glow, that swells the soul-
When swell'd too much, the judgment to control
The happy ear that feels the flowing force
Of the smooth line's uninterrupted course;
Give me, oh give! if not in vain the prayer,
That sacred wealth, poetic worth to share
Be it my boast to please and to improve,
To warm the soul to virtue and to love;

To paint the passions, and to teach mankind
Our greatest pleasures are the most refined;
The cheerful tale with fancy to rehearse,
And gild the moral with the charm of verse.

THE COMPARISON.

Parham, 1778.

FRIENDSHIP is like the gold refined,
And all may weigh its worth;
Love like the ore, brought undesign'd
In virgin beauty forth.

Friendship may pass from age to age,
And yet remain the same;
Love must in many a toil engage,
And melt in lambent flame.

GOLDSMITH TO THE AUTHOR.

"Felix quem faciunt aliena pericula cautum."

Aldborough, 1778.

YOU'RE in love with the Muses! Well, grant it be true,

When, good Sir, were the Muses enamour'd of you?

Read first, if my lectures your fancy delight,

Your taste is diseased:
:- can your cure be to write?

You suppose you're a genius, that ought to engage
The attention of wits, and the smiles of the age:
Would the wits of the age their opinion make known,
Why-every man thinks just the same of his own.

You imagine that Pope-but yourself you beguile —
Would have wrote the same things, had he chose the same

style.

Delude not yourself with so fruitless a hope,

Had he chose the same style, he had never been Pope.

You think of my muse with a friendly regard,
And rejoice in her author's esteem and reward.
But let not his glory your spirits elate,

When pleased with his honours, remember his fate.

FRAGMENT.

"Lord, what is man, that thou art mindful of him?"

PROUD, little Man, opinion's slave,

Aldborough, 1778.

Error's fond child, too duteous to be free,

Say, from the cradle to the grave,

Is not the earth thou tread'st too grand for thee?
This globe that turns thee, on her agile wheel

Moves by deep springs, which thou canst never feel:
Her day and night, her centre and her sun,
Untraced by thee, their annual courses run.
A busy fly, thou sharest the march divine,
And flattering fancy calls the motion thine:
Untaught how soon some hanging grave may burst,
And join thy flimsy substance to the dust.

THE RESURRECTION.

Aldborough, 1778.

THE wintry winds have ceased to blow,

And trembling leaves appear;

And fairest flowers succeed the snow,

And hail the infant year.

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THROUGH a dull tract of woe, of dread,

The toiling year has pass'd and fled :
And, lo! in sad and pensive strain,
I sing my birth-day date again.

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