Surprizes often, while you' look around,

And nothing ftrikes your eye but fights of bliss;
All various Nature preffing on the heart :
An elegant fufficiency, content,
Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books,
Eafe and alternate labour, ufeful life,
Progreffive virtue, and approving Heaven.
These are the matchless joys of virtuous love;
And thus their moments fly. The Seasons thus,
As ceafelefs round a jarring world they roll,
Still find them happy; and confenting Spring
Sheds her own rofy garland on their heads:
Till evening comes at laft, ferene and mild;
When after the long vernal day of life,
Enamour'd more, as more remembrance fwells
With many a proof of recollected love,
Together down they fink in social sleep;
Together freed, their gentle fpirits fly
To scenes where love and blifs immortal reign.

THOMSON.

CHA P. XXVIII.

THE PLEASURES OF RETIREMENT.

KNEW he but his happiness, of men

The happiest he! who far from public rage,
Deep in the vale, with a choice few retir'd,
Drinks the pure pleasures of the rural life.
What tho' the dome be wanting, whofe proud gate,
Each morning, vomits out the fneaking croud
Of flatterers false, and in their turn abus'd?
Vile intercourfe! What tho' the glittering robe,

Of

Of every hue reflected light can give,
Or floated loofe, or ftiff with mazy gold,

The pride and gaze of fools! opprefs him not?
What tho', from utmost land and sea purvey'd,
For him each rarer tributary life

1

Bleeds not, and his infatiate table heaps
With luxury, and death? What tho' his bowl
Flames not with coftly juice; nor funk in beds
Oft of gay care, he toffes out the night,
Or melts the thoughtless hours in idle state?
What tho' he knows not those fantastic joys,
That still amufe the wanton, ftill deceive;
A face of pleafure, but a heart of pain;
Their hollow moments undelighted all?
Sure peace is his; a folid life eftrang'd
To disappointment, and fallacious hope:
Rich in content, in Nature's bounty rich,
In herbs and fruits; whatever greens the Spring,
When heaven defcends in fhowers; or bends the bough
When Summer reddens, and when Autumn beams;

Or in the wint❜ry glebe whatever lies
Conceal'd and fattens with the richest fap:

These are not wanting; nor the milky drove,
Luxuriant, fpread o'er all the lowing vale:
Nor bleating mountains; nor the chide of ftreams,
And hum of bees, inviting fleep fincere
Into the guiltless breaft, beneath the fhade,
Or thrown at large amid the fragrant hay;
Nor aught befides of profpect, grove, or fong,
Dim grottoes, gleaming lakes, and fountain clear.
Here too dwells fimple truth; plain innocence;
Unfullied beauty; found unbroken youth,

4

Patient

Patient of labour, with a little pleas'd;
Health ever blooming; unambitious toil;
Calm contemplation, and poetic ease.

The rage of nations, and the crufh of states,
Move not the man, who, from the world escap❜d,
In ftill retreats, and flowery folitudes,

To Nature's voice attends, from month to month,
And day to day, thro' the revolving year;
Admiring, fees her in her every shape;
Feels all her fweet emotions at his heart;
Takes what she liberal gives, nor thinks of more.
He, when young Spring protrudes the bursting gems,
Marks the first bud, and fucks the healthful gale
Into his freshen'd foul; her genial hours
He full enjoys; and not a beauty blows,
And not an opening bloffom breathes, in vain.
In fummer he, beneath the living fhade,
Such as o'er frigid Tempe wont to wave,
Or Hemus cool, reads what the Mufe, of these
Perhaps, has in immortal numbers fung;
Or what the dictates writes: and, oft an eye
Shot round, rejoices in the vigorous year.
When Autumn's yellow luftre gilds the world,
And tempts the fickled fwain into the field,
Seiz'd by the general joy, his heart diftends
With gentle throws; and, thro' the tepid gleams
Deep mufing, then he beft exerts his fong.
Even Winter wild to him is full of blifs:
The mighty tempeft, and the hoary waste,
Abrupt, and deep, ftretch'd o'er the buried earth
Awake to folemn thought. At night the skies,
Difclos'd, and kindled, by refining froft,

Pour

Pour every luftre on th' exalted eye.

A friend, a book, the stealing hours secure,
And mark them down for wisdom. With swift wing,
O'er land and fea th' imagination roams;

Or truth, divinely breaking on his mind,
Elates his being, and unfolds his powers;
Or in his breast heroic virtue burns.
The touch of kindred too and love he feels;
The modeft eye, whose beams on his alone
Extatic fhine; the little ftrong embrace
Of prattling children, twift around his neck,
And emulous to please him, calling forth
The fond parental foul. Nor purpose gay,
Amusement, dance, or song, he fternly scorns;
For happiness and true philosophy
Are of the focial, ftill, and fmiling kind.

This is the life which those who fret in guilt,

And guilty cities, never knew; the life,

Led by primeval ages, uncorrupt,

When Angels dwelt, and God himself, with man!

CHA P. XXIX.

GEN

I U S.

THOMSON.

FR

ROM heav'n my strains begin; from heav'n defcends The flame of genius to the human breaft, And love and beauty, and poetic joy And inspiration. Ere the radiant fun

Sprang from the east, or 'mid the vault of night

The moon fufpended her ferener lamp;

Ere mountains, woods, or ftreams adorn'd the globe,

Or

Or wisdom taught the fons of men her lore;
Then liv'd th' almighty ONE: then deep retir'd
In his unfathom'd effence, view'd the forms,
The forms eternal of created things;

The radiant fun, the moon's nocturnal lamp,
The mountains, woods and streams, the rolling globe,
And wifdom's mien celeftial. From the first

Of days, on them his love divine he fix'd,
His admiration: till in time compleat,
What he admir'd, and lov'd, his vital smile
Unfolded into being. Hence the breath
Of life informing each organic frame,

Hence the green earth, and wild refounding waves;
Hence light and fhade alternate; warmth and cold;
And clear autumnal fkies and vernal fhow'rs,
And all the fair variety of things.

But not alike to every mortal eye

Is this great fcene unveil'd. For fince the claims
Of focial life, to diff'rent labours urge
The active pow'rs of man; with wife intent
The hand of nature on peculiar minds
Imprints a different bias, and to each
Decrees its province in the common toil.
To fome fhe taught the fabric of the sphere,
The changeful moon, the circuit of the stars,
The golden zones of heav'n: to some she gave
To weigh the moment of eternal things,
Of time, and space, and fate's unbroken chain,
And will's quick impulfe: others by the hand
She led o'er vales and mountains, to explore
What healing virtue fwells the tender veins

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