ON A SIMILAR OCCASION. FOR THE YEAR 1789. -Placidaque ibi demum morte quievit.—VIRG. There calm at length he breathed his soul away. 'O MOST delightful hour by man Experienced here below, The hour that terminates his span, His folly and his woe! 'Worlds should not bribe me back to tread Again life's dreary waste, To see again my day o'erspread 'My home henceforth is in the skies; Earth, seas, and sun, adieu! All heaven unfolded to my eyes, I have no sight for you.' So spake Aspasio, firm possess'd Of faith's supporting rod, Then breathed his soul into its rest, The bosom of his God. He was a man among the few Sincere on virtue's side; And all his strength from Scripture drew, To hourly use applied. That rule he prized, by that he fear'd, For he was frail as thou or I, But, when he felt it, heaved a sigh, Such lived Aspasio; and at last His joys be mine, each reader cries, They shall be yours, my verse replies, ON A SIMILAR OCCASION. FOR THE YEAR 1790. Ne commonentem recta sperne.-BUCHANAN. Despise not my good counsel. He who sits from day to day Hardly knows that he has sung. Where the watchman in his round So your verse-man I and clerk, Yearly in my song proclaim Death at hand—yourselves his mark— And the foe's unerring aim. Duly at my time I come, Publishing to all aloud— Soon the grave must be your home, And your only suit a shroud. But the monitory strain, Oft repeated in your ears, Seems to sound too much in vain, Wins no notice, wakes no fears. Can a truth, by all confess'd Of such magnitude and weight, Grow, by being oft impress'd, Trivial as a parrot's prate? Pleasure's call attention wins, Death and judgment, heaven and hell— No more move us than the bell, O then, ere the turf or tomb Cover us from every eye, Spirit of Instruction, come, Make us learn that we must die. ON A SIMILAR OCCASION. FOR THE YEAR 1792. Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas Happy the mortal, who has traced effects THANKLESS for favours from on high, But he, not wise enough to scan To ages in a world of pain, To ages, where he goes Gall'd by affliction's heavy chain, And hopeless of repose. |