TO SIR GODFREY KNELLER AT HIS

T

COUNTRY SEAT.

O Whitton's fhades, and Hounslow's airy plain,

Thou, Kneller, tak'st thy summer flights in vain, In vain thy wish gives all thy rural hours To the fair villa, and well-order'd bowers; To court thy pencil early at thy gates, Ambition knocks, and fleeting Beauty waits The boastful Muse, of others fame so sure, Implores thy aid to make her own fecure; The Great, the Fair, and, if aught nobler be, Aught more belov'd, the Arts folicit thee.

How canft thou hope to fly the world, in vain
From Europe fever'd by the circling main ;
Sought by the kings of every diftant land,
And every hero worthy of thy hand?
Haft thou forgot that mighty Bourbon fear'd
He still was mortal, till thy draught appear'd?
That Cofmo chofe thy glowing form to place,
Amidft her afters of the Lombard race?
See on her Titian's and her Guido's urns,
Her falling arts forlorn Hefperia mourns z
While Britain wins each garland from her brow,'
Her wit and freedom first, her painting now.

Let the faint copier, on old Tiber's fhore,
Nor mean the task, each breathing buft explore,
Line after line with painful patience trace,
This Roman grandeur, that Athenian grace:

Vain

Vain care of parts; if, impotent of soul,

Th' induftrious workman fails to warm the whole,
Each theft betrays the marble whence it camé,
And a cold ftatue ftiffens in the frame.
Thee Nature taught, nor Art her aid deny'd,
The kindest miftrefs, and the fureft guide,
To catch a likeness at one piercing fight,
And place the fairest in the fairest light;
Ere yet thy pencil tries her nicer toils,
Or on thy palette lie the blended oils,
Thy careless chalk has half atchiev'd thy art,
And her juft image makes Cleora start.

A mind that grafps the whole is rarely found, Half learn'd, half painters, and half wits abound; Few, like thy genius, at proportion aim, All great, all graceful, and throughout the fame. Such be thy life, O fince the glorious rage That fir'd thy youth, flames unfubdued by age; Though wealth, nor fame, now touch thy fated mind, Still tinge the canvas, bounteous to mankind; Since after thee may rise an impious line, Coarfe manglers of the human face divine, Paint on, till Fate diffolve thy mortal part, And live and die the monarch of thy art.

ON THE DEATH OF THE EARL OF

OF

CADOGAN.

Marlborough's captains and Eugenio's friends,
The laft, Cadogan, to the grave defcends :

Low lies each hand, whence Blenheim's glory fprung,
The chiefs who conquer'd, and the bards who fung.
From his cold corfe though every friend be filed,
Lo! Envy waits, that lover of the dead:
Thus did the feign o'er Naffau's hearfe to mourn;
Thus wept infidious, Churchill, o'er thy urn;
To blaft the living, gave the dead their due,
And wreaths, herself had tainted, trim'd anew.
Thou, yet unnam'd to fill his empty place,
And lead to war thy country's growing race,
Take every wish a British heart can frame,
Add palm to palm, and rife from fame to fame.
An hour must come, when thou shalt hear with rage
Thyfelf traduc'd, and curfe a thankless age:
Nor yet for this decline the generous ftrife,

Thefe ills, brave man, thall quit thee with thy life;
Alive though ftain'd by every abject slave,
Secure of fame and juftice in the grave.

Ah! no- -when once the mortal yields to Fate,
The blast of Fame's fweet trumpet founds too late,
Too late to stay the spirit on its flight,
Or footh the new inhabitant of light;

Who hears regardlefs, while fond man, distress'd,
Hangs on the abfent, and laments the bleft.

Farewell

Farewell then Fame, ill fought through fields and blood, Farewell unfaithful promifer of good:

Thou mufic, warbling to the deafen'd ear!
Thou incenfe wafted on the funeral bier!
Through life pursued in vain, by death obtain'd,
When ask'd deny'd us, and when given disdain'd.

AN ODE INSCRIBED TO THE EARL OF SUNDERLAND AT WINDSOR.

TH

I.

HOU dome, where Edward first enroll'd
His red-crofs knights and barons bold,
Whofe vacant feats, by Virtue bought,
Ambitious emperors have fought :
Where Britain's foremost names are found,
In peace belov'd, in war renown'd,
Who made the hoftile nations moan,
Or brought a bleffing on their own:

Once more a fon of Spencer waits,
A name familiar to thy gates;

Sprung from the chief whofe prowess gain'd
The Garter while thy founder reign'd,

He offer'd here his dinted fhield,

The dread of Gauls in Creffi's field,

Which, in thy high-arch'd temple rais'd,
For four long centuries hath blaz’d.

III.

Thefe feats our fires, a hardy kind,
To the fierce fons of war confin'd,
The flower of chivalry, who drew
With finew'd arm the ftubborn yew:
Or with heav'd pole-ax clear'd the field;
Or who, in justs and tourneys skill'd,
Before their ladies' eyes renown'd,
Threw horse and horfeman to the ground.

IV.

In after-times, as courts refin'd,
Our patriots in the lift were join'd.
Not only Warwick ftain'd with blood,
Or Marlborough near the Danube's flood,
Have in their crimson croffes glow'd;
But, on just lawgivers bestow'd,

Thefe emblems Cecil did invest,
And gleam'd on wife Godolphin's breast.

V.

So Greece, ere arts began to rise,
Fix'd huge Orion in the skies,
And ftern Alcides, fam'd in wars,
Befpangled with a thousand stars ;
Till letter'd Athens round the pole
Made gentler conftellations roll;
In the blue heavens the Lyre fhe ftrung,
And near the Maid the * Balance hung.

Names of Conftellations.

VI. Then,