TO SUPERSTITION,

HENCE to some Convent's gloomy aisles, Where cheerful daylight never smiles: Tyrant! from Albion haste, to slavish Rome; There by dim tapers' livid light,

At the still solemn hours of night,

In pensive musings walk o'er many a sounding tomb.

Thy clanking chains, thy crimson steel,
Thy venom'd darts, and barbarous wheel,
Malignant fiend, bear from this isle away,
Nor dare in error's fetters bind
One active, freeborn, British mind;

[sway.

That strongly strives to spring indignant from thy

Thou bad'st grim Moloch's frowning priest Snatch screaming infants from the breast, Regardless of the frantic mother's woes; Thou led'st the ruthless sons of Spain To wondering India's golden plain, From deluges of blood where tenfold harvests rose.

But lo! how swiftly art thou fled,
When Reason lifts his radiant head;
When his resounding, awful yoice they hear,
Blind Ignorance, thy doting sire,

Thy daughter, trembling Fear, retire;
And all thy ghastly train of terrors disappear.

So by the Magi hail'd from far,
When Phoebus mounts his early car,

The shrieking ghosts to their dark charnels flock; The full gorg'd wolves retreat; no more

The prowling lionesses roar,

[rock.

But hasten with their prey to some deep-cavern'd

Hail then, ye friends of Reason, hail!
Ye foes to Mystery's odious veil,

To Truth's high temple guide my steps aright,
Where Clarke and Wollaston reside,

With Locke and Newton by their side,
While Plato sits above enthron'd in endless light.

TO A GENTLEMAN,

UPON HIS TRAVELS THROUGH ITALY.

WHILE I with fond officious care,
For you my chorded shell prepare,
And not unmindful frame au humble lay;
Where shall this verse my Cynthio find,
What scene of art now charms your mind,
Say, on what sacred spot of Roman ground you
stray?

Perhaps you cull each valley's bloom;
To strew o'er Virgil's laurell'd tomb,
Whence oft at midnight echoing voices sound;
For at that hour of silence, there
The shades of ancient bards repair,

To join in choral song his hallow'd urn around;

Or wander in the cooling shade

Of Sabine bowers where Homer stray'd,

And oft repeat, in eager thought elate,
(As round in classic search you trace)
With curious eye the pleasing place,

[sate.'

This fount he lov'd, and there beneath that oak he

How longs my raptur'd breast with you, Great Raphael's magic strokes to view, To whose bless'd hand each charm the Graces gave! Whence each fair form with beauty glows, Like that of Venus, when she rose

Naked in blushing charms from ocean's hoary wave.

As oft by roving fancy led,

To smooth Clitumnus' banks you tread,
What awful thoughts his fabled waters raise!
While the low-thoughted swain, whose flock
Grazes around, from some steep rock,
With vulgar disregard his mazy course surveys.

Now through the ruin'd domes my Muse
Your steps with eager flight pursues,
That their cleft piles on Tyber's plains present;
Among whose hollow-winding cells,

Forlorn and wild, Rome's Genius dwells; His golden sceptre broke, and purple mantle rent.

Oft to those mossy mouldering walls,

Those caverns dark, and silent halls, Let me repair by midnight's paly fires; There muse on Empire's fallen state, And frail Ambition's hapless fate,

[inspires.

While more than mortal thoughts the solemn scene

What lust of power from the cold North

Could tempt those Vandal-robbers forth,

Fair Italy, thy vine-clad vales to waste?
Whose hands profane, with hostile blade,
Thy storied temples dar'd invade,

And all thy Parian seats of Attic art defac'd!

They, weeping Art in fetters bound,

And gor'd her breast with many a wound, And veil'd her charms in clouds of thickest night; Sad Poësy, much injur'd maid,

They drove to some dim convent's shade,

And quench'd in gloomy mist her lamp's resplendent light.

There long she wept to darkness doom'd,
Till Cosmo's hand her light relum'd,
That once again in lofty Tasso shone;

Since has sweet Spenser caught her fire,
She breathed once more in Milton's lyre,
And warm'd the soul divine of Shakspeare, Fancy's

son.

Nor she, mild queen, will cease to smile
On her Britannia's much-lov'd isle,

Where these her best, her favourite Three were born,
While Theron' warbles Grecian strains,

Or polish'd Dodington remains,

The drooping train of arts to cherish and adorn.

1 Akenside.

AGAINST DESPAIR.

FAREWELL, thou dimpled cherub Joy,
Thou rose-crown'd, ever-smiling boy,
Wont thy sister Hope to lead
To dance along the primrose mead!
No more, bereft of happy hours,
I seek thy lute-resounding bow'rs,
But to yon ruin'd tower repair,
To meet the god of groans, Despair;
Who, on that ivy-darken'd ground,
Still takes at eve his silent round,
Or sits yon new-made grave beside,
Where lies a frantic suicide;

While labouring sighs my heart-strings break,
Thus to the sullen power I speak :
'Haste with thy poison'd dagger, haste,
To pierce this sorrow-laden breast!
Or lead me at the dead of night,
To some sea-beat mountain's height,
Whence with headlong haste I'll leap
To the dark bosom of the deep;
Or show me, far from human eye,
Some cave to muse in, starve and die:
No weeping friend or brother near,
My last fond, faltering words to hear.'-
Twas thus with weight of woes oppress'd
I sought to ease my bruised breast;
When straight more gloomy grew the shade,
And lo! a tall majestic maid:
Her limbs, not delicately fair,
Robust, and of a martial air;