By turns they felt the glowing mind
Disturb'd, delighted, raised, refined;
Till once, 'tis said, when all were fired,
Fill'd with fury, rapt, inspired,
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatch'd her instruments of sound;
And as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forceful art,
Each for madness ruled the hour-
Would prove his own expressive power.

First Fear his hand, its skill to try,
Amid the chords bewilder'd laid;
And back recoil'd, he knew not why,
Even at the sound himself had made.

Next Anger rush'd; his eyes on fire
In lightnings own'd his secret stings;
In one rude clash he struck the lyre,
And swept with hurried hand the strings.

With woeful measures wan Despair-
Low, sullen sounds his grief beguiled;
A solemn, strange, and mingled air;
'Twas sad by fits, by starts 'twas wild.

But thou, O Hope! with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure?
Still it whisper'd promised pleasure,
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail!
Still would her touch the strain prolong;
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale,
She call'd on Echo still through all the song:
And where her sweetest theme she chose,

A soft responsive voice was heard at every close,
And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden hair.

And longer had she sung-but, with a frown,

Revenge impatient rose :

He threw his blood-stain'd sword in thunder down,
And, with a withering look,

The war-denouncing trumpet took,

And blew a blast so loud and dread,

Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe!

And ever and anon he beat

The doubling drum with furious heat;

And though sometimes, each dreary pause between,
Dejected Pity at his side,

Her soul-subduing voice applied,

Yet still he kept his wild unalter'd mien, While each strain'd ball of sight seem'd bursting from his head.

Thy numbers, Jealousy, to nought were fix'd,
Sad proof of thy distressful state:

Of differing themes the veering song was mix'd, And now it courted Love, now raving call'd on Hate.

With eyes upraised, as one inspired,

Pale Melancholy sat retired;

And from her wild sequester'd seat,

In notes, by distance made more sweet, Pour'd through the mellow horn her pensive soul; And dashing soft from rocks around,

Bubbling runnels join'd the sound;

Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole ;
Or o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay,
Round a holy calm diffusing,

Love of peace and lonely musing,
In hollow murmurs died away.

But, oh! how alter'd was its sprightlier tone,

When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue,

Her bow across her shoulder flung,

Her buskins gemm'd with morning dew,

Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung,
The hunter's call, to Faun and Dryad known!
The oak-crown'd sisters, and their chaste-eyed

queen,

Satyrs and sylvan boys, were seen

Peeping from forth their alleys green;

Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear,

And Sport leap'd up, and seized his beechen spear.

Last came Joy's ecstatic trial:

He, with viny crown advancing,

First to the lively pipe his hand address'd;
But soon he saw the brisk, awakening viol,
Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best.
They would have thought who heard the strain,
They saw in Tempe's vale, her native maids,
Amidst the festal-sounding shades,

To some unwearied minstrel dancing;
While, as his flying fingers kiss'd the strings,
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round;
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound:
And he, amidst his frolic play,

As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings.

O Music sphere-descended maid,
Friend of pleasure, Wisdom's aid,
Why, Goddess! why, to us denied,
Lay'st thou thy ancient lyre aside?
As in that loved Athenian bower,
You learn'd an all-commanding power,
Thy mimic soul, O nymph endear'd,
Can well recall what then it heard.

Where is thy native simple heart,
Devote to virtue, fancy, art?*
Arise, as in that elder time,
Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime!
Thy wonders in that godlike age
Fill thy recording sister's page-
'Tis said, and I believe the tale,
Thy humblest reed could more prevail,
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age;
E'en all at once together found,
Cecilia's mingled world of sound—
Oh! bid our vain endeavours cease;
Revive the just designs of Greece;
Return in all thy simple state,
Confirm the tales her sons relate!

* The poet here gives expression to the fashionable prejudice, amongst the learned, as to the unapproachable excellence of the old Hellenic and Latin literatures, and, in particular, their poetic superiority. After the age of Shakespeare, Milton, Racine, &c. (crowning the earlier achievments of Dante, Chaucer, Ariosto, and Spenser), such a belief, before incontrovertible, had become an egregious anachronism. Yet towards the end of the seventeenth century a controversy, almost theological in its bitterness, was long maintained between the partizans of the 'Ancients and Moderns;' and Perrault's assault upon the hitherto unquestioned position of the former was resented by Sir W. Temple in the most extravagant apology or rather eulogy ever published. All the most famous wits and littérateurs joined in the fray; the most influentialPope, Swift, Boyle, &c., ranging themselves on the orthodox side. The 'Battle of the Books' was renewed in the middle of the last century, when the Encyclopédistes succeeded to the heretics of the previous age. What was an absurd prejudice in the days of Temple, is, at the present day, an egregious folly. Yet we still hear the term 'classical' (meaning 'of the first class') commonly and entirely appropriated to the old Hellenic and Latin writers! As for the virtues of the ancient sages, so much lauded, they were, according to the facts of history, of a somewhat negative kind.

*

DIRGE TO FIDELE.*

To fair Fidele's grassy tomb

Soft maids and village hinds shall bring
Each opening sweet of earliest bloom,
And rifle all the breathing Spring.

No wailing ghost shall dare appear,
To vex with shrieks this quiet grove;
But shepherd lads assemble here,

And melting virgins own their love.

No wither'd witch shall here be seen,

No goblins lead their nightly crew;
The female fays shall haunt the green,
And dress thy grave with pearly dew!

The redbreast oft, at evening hours,
Shall kindly lend his little aid,
With hoary moss, and gather'd flowers,

To deck the ground where thou art laid.

When howling winds and beating rain
In tempests shake the sylvan cell;

Or 'midst the chase, on every plain,

The tender thought on thee shall dwell;

Each lonely scene shall thee restore;
For thee the tear be duly shed;
Beloved, till life can charm no more,

And mourn'd, till Pity's self be dead.

An imitation of the dirge sung by Guiderius and Arviragus over the grave of Fidele, supposed to be dead. See Cymbeline.