The treach'rous critic's cover'd guile, Bursting with undiminished fires, Streams murmur, meadows smile, fair maids In distant air the music dies, And leaves him with exhausted frame While trembling hand can scarce impart The mark of Calumny and Wrong, I stand Unkindness' sons among; 90 100 110 Dare heap, as with impunity, Their contumelious wrongs on me: the ties of blood undone ! Paternal acres, lov'd, ador'd, That could my infant days afford Such pure delights, as rise again, With rapture that amounts to dain; Is there... Full many a year of blackest grief I still have nurs'd the fond belief, ? The time at last would come, when I, Repaid for all my agony, In age's hour should sit at ease 120 130 Beneath hereditary trees, And calmly should descend to death, The shades that thicken round my head; 140 The vessel's weaken'd powers assail, 66 Shining beyond yon milky way, Where, (if on earth no peace abound,) Yon seat of rest, where seraphs blaze; 'Tis true, dear friend; then I must close 150 159 "COMPLAIN; for ever still complain ! Or storms, that in your fancy's eye Well dost thou say: perchance no good It is, o'er coming glooms to brood: In present good the careless day, Walk, ride, dig, saunter in the shade, Or stray, where bards before have stray'd, Or sit at ease, and My unpremeditated song, 10 While varied visions play about The best, the happiest, and most wise. Why should I vex my morbid frame With thoughts, that put me in a flame? With anger at the scoundrel's wiles, Whose infamy my pen defiles?'' With, scorn, that breaks its just control, At the poor insults of a fool? With Treachery's trick, and Falsehood's vow, And chang'd Affection's alter'd brow? While Competence will yet bestow The little that we want below, The frugal meal, the simple vest, The roof, tho' straw-built; what's the rest? Superfluous luxury, that ne'er Could lull to sleep a single care! Fortune, that jade, may on us frown, And think to keep our spirits down ; 20 30 40 |