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World beyond world, in infinite extent,
Profufely scatter'd o'er the blue immense,
Shew me; their motions, periods, and their laws,
Give me to scan; thro' the disclosing deep

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Light my blind way; the mineral ftrata there;
Thruft, blooming, thence, the vegetable world;
O'er that the rifing system, more complex,
Of animals, and, higher still, the mind, 1360
The varied scene of quick-compounded thought,
And where the mixing paffions endless shift:
These ever open to my ravish'd eye,

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A search the flight of time can ne'er exhaust!
But if to that unequal, if the blood,
In fluggish streams about my heart, forbid
That beft ambition, under clofing shades,
Inglorious, lay me by the lowly brook,
And whisper to my dreams. From Thee begin,
Dwell all on Thee, with Thee conclude my fong,
And let me never, never ftray from Thee!

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THE fubje&t propofedi Addrefs to the Earl of Wilmington. First approach of Winter. According to the natural courfe of the feafon, various forms defcribed. Rain. Wind. Snow. The driving of the fnows: A man perishing among them; whence reflections on the wants and miferies of human life. The wolves defcending from the Alps and Apennines. A wintry-evening defcribed as spent by philofophers; by the country people; in the City.. Froft. A view of Winter within the Polar Circle. A thaw. The whole concluding with moral reflections on a future ftate.

SEE, Winter comes to rule the varied year,

Sullen and fad, with all his rifing train,

Vapours, and clouds, and ftorms. Be thefe my theme,
These that exalt the foul to folemn thought
And heavenly mufing. Welcome, kindred Glooms! 5
Congenial Horrors, hail! with frequent foot
Pleas'd have I, in my cheerful morn of life,
When nurs'd by careless Solitude I liv'd,
And fung of Nature with unceafing joy,
Pleas'd have I wander'd thro' your rough domain, 10
Trod the pure virgin-fnows, myself as pure,
Heard the winds roar, and the big torrent burst,
Or feen the deep-fermenting tempeft brew'd
In the grim evening fky. Thus pass'd the time,

Till thro' the lucid chambers of the South

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Look'd out the joyous Spring, look'd out, and smil’d.

To thee, the patron of her first essay,

The Muse, O Wilmington! renews her fong.
Since has the rounded the revolving year,
Skimm'd the gay Spring; on eagle-pinions borne,20
Attempted thro' the Summer-blaze to rife,
Then swept o'er Autumn with the shadowy gale,
And now among the Wintry clouds again,
Roll'd in the doubling storm, she tries to foar,
To fwell her note with all the rushing winds, 25
To fuit her founding cadence to the floods,
As is her theme, her numbers wildly great":
Thrice happy! could fhe fill thy judging ear
With bold defcription and with manly thought.
Nor art thou kill'd in awful schemes alone,
And how to make a mighty people thrive;
But equal goodness, found integrity,
A firm, unshaken, uncorrupted foul
Amid a sliding age, and, burning ftrong,
Nor vainly blazing for thy country's weal,
A fteady spirit regularly free:

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Thefe, each exalting each, the statefman light
Into the patriot; thefe the public hope
And eye to thee converting, bid the Mufe
Record what Envy dares not flattery call.
Now when the cheerlefs empire of the sky
To Capricorn the Centaur Archer yields, ́

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And fierce Aquarius ftains th' inverted year,
Hung o'er the fartheft verge of heaven the fun
Scarce fpreads thro' ether the dejected day.
Faint are his gleams, and ineffectual shoot
His ftruggling rays, in horizontal lines,"
Thro' the thick air, as cloth'd in cloudy storm,
Weak, wan, and broad, he skirts the fouthern fky,
And, foon defcending, to the long dark night, 50
Wide-shading all, the proftrate world refigns.
Nor is the night unwifh'd, while vital heat,
Light, life, and joy, the dubious day forfake.
Mean time in fable cincture shadows vast,
Deep-ting'd and damp, and congregated clouds, 55
And all the vapoury turbulence of heaven,
Involve the face of things. Thus Winter falls,
A heavy gloom oppreffive o'er the world,
Thro' Nature fhedding influence malign,
And roufes up the feeds of dark disease.
The foul of Man dies in him, loathing life,
And black with more than melancholy views.
The cattle droop, and o'er the furrow'd land,
Fresh from the plough, the dun-difcolour'd flocks,
Untended spreading, crop the wholefome root. 65
Along the woods, along the moorish fens,
Sighs the fad Genius of the coming ftorm,
And up among the loose disjointed cliffs,

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And fractured mountains wild, the brawling brook Volume 1.

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And cave, prefageful, fend a hollow moan,
Resounding long in listening Fancy's ear.

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Then comes the Father of the tempeft forth,
Wrapt in black glooms. First joylefs rains, obscure,
Drive thro' the mingling fkies with vapour foul,
Dash on the mountain's brow, and shake the woods,
That grumbling wave below. The unfightly plain 76
Lies a brown deluge, as the low-bent clouds
Pour flood on flood, yet unexhausted still
Combine, and, deepening into night, fhut up

The day's fair face. The wanderers of heaven 80
Each to his home retire, fave thofe that love
To take their pastime in the troubled air,
Or fkimming flutter round the dimply pool.
The cattle from the untafted fields return,

And afk, with meaning low, their wonted stalls, 85
Or ruminate in the contiguous shade.

Thither the household feathery people crowd,

The crefted cock, with all his female train,
Penfive, and dripping, while the cottage-hind
Hangs o'er th' enlivening blaze, and taleful there go
Recounts his fimple frolic: much he talks,
And much he laughs, nor recks the ftorm that blows
Without, and rattles on his humble roof.

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Wide o'er the brim, with many a torrent fwell'd, And the mix'd ruin of its banks o'erspread, At laft the rous'd-up river pours along: Refiftlefs, roaring, dreadful, down it comes,

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