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Some truths, from long experience flowing,
Worth more than royal grants, receive;
For truths are wealth of Heaven's bestowing,
Which kings have seldom power to give.
Since, from an ancient race descended,
You boast an unattainted blood,
By yours be their fair fame attended,
And claim by birthright to be good.
In love for every fellow creature
Superior rise above the crowd;
What most ennobles human nature

Was ne'er the portion of the proud.
'Be thine the generous heart that borrows
From others' joys a friendly glow;
And for each hapless neighbour's sorrows,
Throbs with a sympathetic woe.

'This is the temper most endearing;

Though wide proud pomp her banners spreads, An heavenlier power good nature bearing Each heart in willing thraldom leads. 'Taste not from fame's uncertain fountain The peace-destroying streams that flow, Nor from ambition's dangerous mountain Look down upon the world below. The princely pine on hills exalted, Whose lofty branches cleave the sky, By winds, long braved, at last assaulted, Is headlong whirl'd in dust to lie;

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Whilst the mild rose, more safely growing
Low in its unaspiring vale,

Amidst retirement's shelter blowing,

Exchanges sweets with every gale.

Wish not for beauty's darling features, Moulded by nature's fondling power, For fairest forms 'mong human creatures Shine but the pageants of an hour. 'I saw the pride of all the meadow, At noon, a gay Narcissus, blow Upon a river's bank, whose shadow Bloom'd in the silver waves below; 'By noontide's heat its youth was wasted, The waters, as they pass'd, complain'd: At eve its glories all were blasted,

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And not one former tint remain'd.
Nor let vain wit's deceitful glory
Lead you from wisdom's path astray;
What genius lives renown'd in story,
To happiness who found the way?
In yonder mead behold that vapour
Whose vivid beams illusive play,
Far off it seems a friendly taper

To guide the traveller on his way;

'But should some hapless wretch, pursuing,
Tread where the treacherous meteors glow,
He'd find, too late his rashness ruing,
That fatal quicksands lurk below.
In life such bubbles nought admiring,
Gilt with false light, and fill'd with air,
Do you, from pageant crowds retiring,
To peace in virtue's cot repair;

There seek the never wasted treasure,
Which mutual love and friendship give,
Domestic comfort, spotless pleasure,
And bless'd and blessing you will live.

If Heaven with children crown your dwelling,
As mine its bounty does with you,
In fondness fatherly excelling,

The' example you have felt pursue.'
He paused-for tenderly caressing
The darling of his wounded heart,
Looks had means only of expressing
Thoughts language never could impart.
Now night her mournful mantle spreading,
Had robed with black the' horizon round,
And dank dews, from her tresses shedding,
With genial moisture bathed the ground;
When back to city follies flying

.

Midst custom's slaves he lived resign'd,
His face, array'd in smiles, denying
The true complexion of his mind;
For, seriously around surveying
Each character, in youth and age,
Of fools betray'd and knaves betraying,
That play'd upon this human stage;
(Peaceful himself and undesigning)

He loathed the scenes of guile and strife,
And felt each secret wish inclining

To leave this fretful farce of life.

Yet to whate'er above was fated
Obediently he bow'd his soul;

For what all bounteous Heaven created,
He thought Heaven only should control.

I

THE TOMB OF SHAKSPEARE.

A Wision.

WHAT time the jocund rosy-bosom'd hours
Led forth the train of Phoebus and the spring,
And zephyr mild profusely scatter'd flowers

On earth's green mantle from his musky wing; The morn unbarr'd the' ambrosial gates of light, Westward the raven-pinion'd darkness flew, The landscape smiled in vernal beauty bright,

And to their graves the sullen ghosts withdrew. The nightingale no longer swell'd her throat With lovelorn plainings, tremulous and slow; And on the wings of silence ceased to float The gurgling notes of her melodious woe: The god of sleep mysterious visions led In gay procession 'fore the mental eye, freed soul a while her mansion fled, To try her plumes for immortality.

And my

Through fields of air methought I took my flight,
Through every clime, o'er every region pass'd,
No paradise or ruin scaped my sight,
Hesperian garden or Cimmerian waste.

On Avon's banks I lit, whose streams appear
To wind with eddies fond round Shakspeare's

tomb,

The year's first feathery songsters warble near, And violets breathe and earliest roses bloom.

Here Fancy sat (her dewy fingers cold

Decking with flowerets fresh the' unsullied sod) And bathed with tears the sad sepulchral mould, Her favourite offspring's long and last abode.

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· Ah! what avails (she cried a poet's name?
Ah! what avails the immortalizing breath
To snatch from dumb oblivion other's fame?
My darling child here lies a prey to death!

Let gentle Otway, white robed pity's priest, From grief domestic teach the tears to flow; Or Southern captivate the impassion'd breast With heartfelt sighs and sympathy of woe. · For not to these his genius was confined, Nature and I each tuneful power had given, Poetic transports of the maddening mind, And the wing'd words that waft the soul to heaven.

The fiery glance of the' intellectual eye, Piercing all objects of creation's store, Which on this world's extended surface lie; And plastic thought that still created more.'

O grant (with eager rapture I replied), Grant me, great goddess of the changeful eye! To view each being in poetic pride, To whom thy son gave immortality.'

Sweet Fancy smiled and waved her mystic rod, When straight these visions felt her powerful And one by one succeeded at her nod,

[arm, As vassal sprites obey the wizard's charm.

First a celestial form ' (of azure hue,

Whose mantle, bound with brede etherial, flow'd To each soft breeze its balmy breath that drew) Swift down the sunbeams of the noontide rode.

Ariel, in the Tempest.

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