Which, in loose bondage, would ensnare
BELLARIO bright and FLAVIA fair.
Oft had he promis'd to attend
The nuptials of his happy friend :
To go-to stay-alike he fears;
At length a bolder flight he dares :
TO CELIA he resolves to fly,

And catch fresh virtue from her eye,
Though three full weeks did yet remain,
Ere he engag'd to come again.
This plan he tremblingly embrac'd,
With doubtful zeal, and fluttering haste;
Nor ventur'd he one card to read,
Which might his virtuous scheme impede ;
Each note, he dreaded might betray him,
And shudder'd lest each rap should stay him.
Behold him seated in his chaise;
With face that self distrust betrays;
He hazards not a single glance,
Nor through the glasses peeps by chance,
Lest some old friend, or haunt well known,
Should melt his resolution down.
Fast as his foaming coursers fly,
Hyde-park attracts his half-rais'd eye;
He steals one fearful, conscious look,
Then drops his eye upon his book.
Triumphant he persists to go;
But gives one sigh to Rotten-row.
Long as he view'd AUGUSTA's tow'rs,
The sight relax'd his thinking pow'rs;
In vain he better plans revolves,
While the soft scene his soul dissolves;
The tow'rs once lost, his view he bends,
Where the receding smoke ascends;
But when nor smoke, nor tow'rs arise,
To charm his heart or cheat his eyes;
When once he got entirely clear
From this enfeebling atmosphere;
His mind was brac'd, his spirits light,
His heart was gay, his humour bright.
Thus feeling, at his inmost soul,
The sweet reward of self-controul,
Impatient now, and all alive,
He thought he never should arrive;
At last he spies Sir Gilbert's trees;
Now the near battlements he sees;
The gates he enter'd with delight,
And, self-announc'd, embrac'd the knight:
The youth his joy unfeign'd exprest,
The knight with joy receiv'd his guest,
And own'd, with no unwilling tongue,
"Twas done like men when he was young.
Three weeks subducted, went to prove,
A feeling like old-fashion'd love.

For Celia, not a word she said,
But blush'd,' celestial, rosy red !'

Her modest charms transport the youth,

Who promis'd everlasting truth.

Celia, in honour of the day, Unusual splendour would display : Such was the charm her sweetness gave, He thought her wedgwood had been séve, Her taste diffused a gracious air, And chaste Simplicity was there, Whose secret power, though silent, great is, The loveliest of the sweet Penates. Florio, now present to the scene, With spirits light, and gracious mien, Sir Gilbert's port politely praises, And carefully avoids French phrases;

Endures the daily dissertation
On land-tax, and a ruin'd nation;
Listens to many a tedious tale
Of poachers, who deserv'd a jail;
Heard all the business of the quorum,
Each cause and crime produc'd before 'em:
Heard them abuse with complaisance
The language, wines, and wits of France;
Nor did he hum a single air,
While good Sir Gilbert fill'd his chair.
Abroad, with joy and grateful pride,
He walks, with Celia by his side:
A thousand cheerful thoughts arise,
Each rural scene enchants his eyes;
With transports he begins to look
On Nature's all instructive book;
No objects now seem mean, or low,
Which point to Him from whom they flow.
A berry or a bud excites

A chain of reasoning which delights,
Which spite of sceptic ebulitions,
Proves atheists not the best logicians.
A tree, a brook, a blade of grass,
Suggests reflections as they pass,
Till Florio, with a sigh, confest
The simplest pleasures are the best
Bellario's systems sink in air,
He feels the perfect, good, and fair.
As pious Celia rais'd the theme
To holy faith and love supreme;
Enlighten'd Florio learn'd to trace
In Nature's God the God of grace.

In wisdom as the convert grew
The hours on rapid pinions flew,
When call'd to dress, that Titus wore
A wig the alter'd Florio swore;
Or else, in estimating time,
He ne'er had mark'd it as a crime,
That he had lost but one day's blessing,
When we so many lose, by dressing.
The rest, suffice it now to say,
Was finish'd in the usual way.
Cupid, impatient for his hour,
Revil'd slow Themis' tedious power,
Whose parchment legends, singing, sealing,
Are cruel forms for Love to deal in.

At length to Florio's eager eyes,
Behold the day of bliss arise!
The golden sun illumes the globe,
The burning torch, the saffron robe.
Just as of old, glad Hymen wears,
And Cupid, as of old, appears

In Hymen's train; so strange the case
They hardly knew each other's face;
Yet both confess'd with glowing heart
They never were design'd to part;
Quoth Hymen, sure you're strangely slighted
At weddings not to be invited;

The reason's clear enough, quoth Cupid,
My company is thought but stupid,
Where Plutus is the favourite guest,
For he and I scarce speak at best.

The self-same sun which joins the twain
Sees Flavia sever'd from her swain;
Bellario sues for a divorce,
And both pursue their sep'rate course.

Oh wedded love! thy bliss how rare!
And yet the ill-assorted pair;
The pair who choose at Fashion's voice,
Or drag the chain of venal choice;

Have little cause to curse the state,
Who make, should never blame their fate,
Such flimsy ties, say where's the wonder,
If Doctors Commons snap asunder.
In either case, 'tis still the wife,
Gives cast and colour to the life.
Florio escap'd from Fashion's school

His heart and conduct learns to rule; Conscience his useful life approves; He serves his God, his country loves; Reveres her laws, protects her rights, And, for her interests, pleads or fights Reviews with scorn his former life, And, for his rescue, thanks his wife.

If Heaven has into being deign'd to call
Thy light, O liberty! to shine on all;
Bright intellectual sun! why does thy ray
To earth distribute only partial day?
Since no resisting cause from spirit flows
Thy universal presence to oppose;
No obstacles by nature's hand imprest,
Thy subtle and ethereal beams arrest;
Not sway'd by Matter is thy course benign,
Or more direct or more oblique to shine;
Nor Motion's laws can speed thy active course,
Nor strong Repulsion's pow'rs obstruct thy
force;

Since there is no convexity in mind,
Why are thy genial beams to parts confin'd?
While the chill north with thy bright ray is
blest,

Why should fell darkness half the south invest?
Was it decreed, fair Freedom! at thy birth,
That thou should'd ne'er irradiate all the earth?
While Britain basks in thy full blaze of light,
Why lies sad Afric quench'd in total night?

Thee only, sober goddess! I attest,
In smiles chastis'd, and decent graces drest,
To thee alone pure daughter of the skies,
The hallow'd incense of the bard should rise?
Not that mad liberty, in whose wild praise
Too oft he trims his prostituted bays;
Not that unlicens'd monster of the crowd,
Whose roar terrific bursts in peals so loud,
Deaf'ning the ear of Peace; fierce Faction's tool,
Of rash Sedition born, and mad Misrule;
Whose stubborn mouth, rejecting Reason's
reign,

No strength can govern, and no skill restrain ;
Whose magic cries the frantic vulgar draw
To spurn at Order, and to outrage Law;
To tread on grave Authority and Pow'r,
And shake the work of ages in an hour:
Convuls'd her voice, and pestilent her breath,
She raves of mercy, while she deals out death;
Each blast is fate; she darts from either hand
Red conflagration o'er the astonish'd land;
Clamouring for peace, she rends the air with
noise,

And to reform a part, the whole destroys.
Reviles oppression only to oppress,
And in the act of murder, breathes redress.
Such have we seen on Freedom's genuine coast,

Thompson's "Liberty.”

Bellowing for blessings which were never lost. 'Tis past, and Reason rules the lucid hour, And beauteous ORDER reassumes his power: Lord of the bright ascendant may he reign, Till perfect Peace eternal sway maintain !*

O, plaintive Southernet whose impassion'd page

Can melt the soul to grief, or rouse to rage!
Now, when congenial themes engage the
Muse,

She burns to emulate thy generous views;
Her failing efforts mock her fond desires,
She shares thy feelings, not partakes thy fires.
Strange pow'r of song the strain that warms the
heart

Seems the same inspiration to impart;
Touch'd by th' extrinsic energy alone,
We think the flame which melts us is our own:
Deceiv'd, for genius we mistake delight,
Charm'd as we read, we fancy we can write.
Though not to me, sweet bard, thy pow'rs

belong,

The cause I plead shall sanctify my song.
The Muse awakes no artificial fire,
For Truth rejects what Fancy would inspire:
Here Art would weave her gayest flow'rs in vain,
The bright invention Nature would disdain.
For no fictitious ills these numbers flow,
But living anguish, and substantial wo;
No individual griefs my bosom melt,
For millions feel what Oronoko felt:
Fir'd by no single wrongs, the countless host
I mourn, by rapine dragg'd from Afric's coast.
Perish th' illiberal thought which would de-
base

The native genius of the sable race!
Perish the proud philosophy, which sought
To rob them of the pow'rs of equal thought!
Does then th' immortal principle within
Change with the casual colour of the skin?
Does Matter govern Spirit? or is mind
Degraded by the form to which 'tis join'd?

No: they have heads to think, and hearts to
feel,

And souls to act, with firm, though erring zeal : For they have keen affections, kind desires, Love strong as death, and active patriot fires;

* Alluding to the riots of London in the year 1780. † Author of the tragedy of Oronoko.

All the rude energy, the fervid flame,
Of high-soul'd passion, and ingenuous shame :
Strong, but luxuriant virtues boldly shoot
From the wild vigour of a savage root.

Nor weak their sense of honour's proud con-
trol,

For Pride is virtue in a Pagan soul;
A sense of worth, a conscience of desert,
A high, unbroken haughtiness of heart;
That self-same stuff which erst proud empires
sway'd,
[made.
Of which the conquerors of the world were
Capricious fate of men! that very pride
In Afric scourg'd, in Rome was deify'd.
No muse, O Quashi!* shall thy deeds relate,
No statue snatch thee from oblivious fate!
For thou wast born where never gentle Muse
On valour's grave the flow'rs of Genius strews;
And thou wast born where no recording page
Plucks the fair deed from Time's devouring rage:
Had Fortune plac'd thee on some happier coast,
Where polis'd Pagans souls heroic boast,
To thee who sought'st a voluntary grave,
Th' injur'd honours of thy name to save,
Whose generous arm thy barbarous master
spar'd,

Altars had smok'd, and temples had been rear'd.
Whene'er to Afric's shores I turn my eyes,
Horrors of deepest, deadliest guilt arise;
I see, by more than Fancy's mirror shown,
The burning village and the blazing town :
See the dire victim torn from social life,
The shrieking babe, the agonizing wife!
She, wretch forlorn! is dragg'd by hostile hands,
To distant tyrants sold, in distant lands!
Transmitted miseries, and successive chains,
The sole sad heritage her child obtains!
E'en this last wretched boon their foes deny,
To weep together, or together die.
By felon hands, by one relentless stroke,
See the fond links of feeling Nature broke!
The fibres twisting round a parent's heart,
Torn from their grasp, and bleeding as they part.
Hold! murderer's, hold! nor aggravate distress;
Respect the passions you yourselves possess,
Ev'n you of ruffian heart, and ruthless hand,
Love your own offspring, love your native land:
Ev'n you, with fond impatient feelings burn,
Though free as air, though certain of return,
Then, if to you who voluntarily roam,
So dear the memory of your distant home,
O think how absence the lov'd scene endears
To him whose food is groans, whose drink is

tears;

* It is a point of honour among negroes of a high spirit to die rather than to suffer their glossy skin to bear the mark of the whip. Quashi had somehow offended his master, a young planter with whom he had been bred up in the endearing intimacy of a play-fellow. His services had been faithful; his attachment affectionate. The master resolved to punish him, and pursued him for that purpose. In trying to escape Quashi stumbled and fell; the master fell upon him: they wrestled long with doubtful victory; at length Quashi got uppermost, and being firmly seated on his master's breast, he secured his legs with one hand, and with the other drew a sharp knife, then said, 'master, I have been bred up with you from a child; I loved you as myself; in return, you have condemned me to a punishment of which I must ever have borne the marks-thus only can I avoid them;' so saying, he drew the knife with all his strength across his own throat, and fell down dead, without a groan, on his master's body.--Ramsay's Essay on the Treatment of African Slaves.

Think on the wretch whose aggravated pains
To exile misery adds, to misery chains.
If warm your heart, to British feelings true,
As dear his land to him as yours to you;
And Liberty, in you a hallow'd flame,
Burns, unextinguish'd in his breast the same.
Then leave him holy Freedom's cheering smile,
The heav'n-taught fondness for the parent soil;
Revere affections mingled with our frame,
In every nature, every clime the same;
In all, these feelings equal sway maintain :
In all the love of Home and Freedom reign;
And Tempe's vale, and parch'd Angola's sand,
One equal fondness of their son's command.
Th' unconquer'd savage laughs at pain and toil,
Basking in Freedom's beams which gild his na-
tive soil.

Does thirst of empire, does desire of fame, (For these are specious crimes) our rage inflame?

No: sordid lust of gold their fate controls,
The basest appetite of basest souls ;
Gold, better gain'd by what their ripening sky,
Their fertile fields, their arts,* and mines supply.
What wrongs, what injuries does Oppression
plead,

To smooth the crime and sanctify the deed?
What strange offence, what aggravated sin?
They stand convicted-of a darker skin!
Barbarians, hold! th' opprobrious commerce
spare,

Respect His sacred image which they bear.
Though dark and savage, ignorant and blind,
They claim the common privilege of kind;
Let malice strip them of each other plea,
They still are men, and men should still be free.
Insulted Reason loaths the inverted trade-
Loathes, as she views the human purchase made;
The outrag'd goddess, with abhorrent eyes,
Sees MAN the traffic, SOULS the merchandise!
Man, whom fair Commerce taught with judging

eye,

And liberal hand, to barter or to buy,
Indignant Nature blushes to behold,
Degraded man himself, truck'd, barter'd, sold:
Of ev'ry native privilege bereft,
Yet curs'd with ev'ry wounded feeling left.
Hard lot! each brutal suff'ring to sustain,
Yet keep the sense acute of human pain.
Plead not, in reason's palpable abuse,
Their sense of feelingt callous and obtuse:
From heads to hearts lies Nature's plain appeal,
Though few can reason, all mankind can feel.
Though wit may boast a livelier dread of shame,
A loftier sense of long refinement claim;
Though polish'd manners may fresh wants in-
vent,

And nice distinctions nicer souls torment;
Though these on finer spirits heavier fall,
Yet natural evils are the same to all.
Tho' wounds there are which reason's force
heal,

There needs no logic sure to make us feel.
The nerve, howe'er untutor'd, can sustain
A sharp unutterable sense of pain;

may

* Besides many valuable productions of the soil, cloths and carpets of exquisite manufacture are brought from the coast of Guinea.

Nothing is more frequent than this cruel and stupid argument, that they do not feel the miseries inflicted on them as Europeans would do.

As exquisitely fashion'd in a slave,
As where unequal fate a sceptre gave.
Sense is as keen where Gambia's waters glide,
As where proud Tiber rolls his classic tide.
Though verse or rhetoric point the feeling line,
They do not whet sensation, but define.
Did ever wretch less feel the galling chain,
When Zeno prov'd there was no ill in pain?
In vain the sage to smooth its horror tries;
Spartans and Helots see with different eyes;
Their miseries philosophic quirks deride,
Slaves groan in pangs disown'd by stoic pride.
When the fierce sun darts vertical his beams,
And thirst and hunger mix their wild extremes;
When the sharp iron* wounds his inmost soul,
And his strain'd eyes in burning anguish roll;
Will the parch'd negro own, ere he expire,
No pain in hunger, and no heat in fire?

For him, when agony his frame destroys,
What hope of present fame or future joys?
For that have heroes shorten'd nature's date,
For this have martyrs gladly met their fate;
But him forlorn, no heroes pride sustains,
No martyr's blissful vision soothe his pains;
Sullen, he mingles with his kindred dust,
For he has learn'd to dread the Christian's trust;
To him what mercy can that God display,
Whose servants murder, and whose sons betray?
Savage! thy venial error I deplore,
They are not Christians who infest thy shore.

O thou sad spirit, whose preposterous yoke
The great deliverer Death, at length has broke,
Releas'd from misery, and escap'd from care,
Go, meet that mercy man deny'd thee here.
In thy dark home, sure refuge of th' oppress'd,
The wicked vex not, and the weary rest.
And, if some notions, vague and undefin'd,
Of future terrors have assail'd thy mind ;
If such thy masters have presum'd to teach,
As terrors only they are prone to preach;
(For should they paint eternal Mercy's reign,
Where were the oppressor's rod, the captive's
chain ?)

If, then, thy troubled soul has learn'd to dread
The dark unknown thy trembling footsteps tread;
On HIM, who made thee what thou art, depend;
HE, who withholds the means, accepts the end.
Thy metal night thy Saviour will not blame;
He died for those who never heard his name.
Not thine the reckoning dire of LIGHT abus'd,
KNOWLEDGE disgrac'd, and LIBERTY misus'd;
On thee no awful judge incens'd shall sit
For parts perverted, and dishonour'd wit.
Where ignorance may be found the safest plea,
How many learn'd and wise shall envy thee!
And thou, WHITE SAVAGE! whether lust of gold
Or lust of conquest rule thee uncontroll'd!
Hero, or robber!-by whatever name!-
Thou plead thy impious claim to wealth or fame;
Whether inferior mischief be thy boast,
A tyrant trader rifling Congo's coast;
Or bolder carnage track thy crimson way,
Kings dispossess'd, and provinces thy prey;
Whether thou pant to tame earth's distant
bound;

* This is not said figuratively. The writer of these lines has seen a complete set of chains, fitted to every separate limb of these unhappy, innocent men; together with instruments for wrenching open the jaws, contrived with such ingenious cruelty as would gratify the tender mercies of an inquisitor.

All Cortez murder'd, all Columbus found;
O'er plunder'd realms to reign, detested lord,
Make millions wretched, and thyself abhorr'd:-
Whether Cartouche in forests break the law.
Or bolder Cæsar keep the world in awe;
In Reason's eye, in Wisdom's fair account,
Your sum of glory boasts a like amount;
The means may differ, but the end's the same,
Conquest is pillage with a nobler name,
Who makes the sum of human blessings less,
Or sinks the stock of general happiness,
Tho' erring fame may grace, tho' false renown
His life may blazon or his memory crown;
Yet the last audit shall reverse the cause;
And God shall vindicate his broken laws.

Had those advent'rous spirits who explore Thro' ocean's trackless wastes, the far-sought shore ;

Whether of wealth insatiate, or of pow'r,
Conquerors who waste, or ruffian's who devour:
Had these possess'd, O Cook! thy gentle mind,
Thy love of arts, thy love of human kind;
Had these pursued thy mild and liberal plan,
DISCOVERIES had not been a curse to man!
Then, bless'd Philanthropy! thy social hands,
Had link'd dissever'd worlds in brothers' bands;
Careless, if colour, or if clime divide;
Then lov'd and loving, man had liv'd and died.
Then with pernicious skill we had not known
To bring their vices back and leave our own.
The purest wreaths which hang on Glory's
shrine,

For empires founded, peaceful Penn! are thine;
No blood-stain'd laurels crown'd thy virtuous
toil,
[soil,

No slaughter'd natives drench'd thy fair-earn'd
Still thy meek spirit in thy flock* survives,
Consistent still, their doctrines rule their lives;
Thy followers only have effac'd the shame,
Inscrib'd by SLAVERY on the Christian name.
Shall Britain, where the soul of freedom
reigns,

Forge chains for others she herself disdains?
Forbid it, Heaven! O let the nations know
The liberty she loves, she will bestow;
Not to herself the glorious gift confin'd,
She spreads the blessing wide as human kind
And, scorning narrow views of time and place,
Bids all be free in earth's extended space.

What page of human annals can record
A deed so bright as human rights restor❜d?
O may that god-like deed, that shining page,
Redeem OUR fame, and consecrate our age!
And let this glory mark our favour'd shore,
To curb False Freedom and the True restore.
And see the cherub Mercy from above,
Descending softly, quits the sphere of love!
On Britain's isle she sheds her heavenly dew;
And breathes her spirit o'er th' enlighten'd few.
From soul to soul the spreading influence steals,
Till every breast the soft contagion feels.
She speeds, exulting, to the burning shore,
With the best message angel ever bore;
Hark! 'tis the note which spoke a Saviour's
birth!

Glory to God on high, and peace on earth !
She vindicates the pow'r in Heaven ador'd,

*The Quakers have emancipated all their slaves throughout America,