Servius', the king who laid the solid base

On which o'er earth the vast republic spread.

Then the great consuls venerable rise.
The public father who the private quelled,
As on the dread tribunal sternly sad,

He whom his thankless country could not lose,
Camillus, only vengeful to her foes.
Fabricius 3, scorner of all-conquering gold;
And Cincinnatus, awful from the plough.
Thy willing victim, Carthage, bursting loose
From all that pleading nature could oppose,
From a whole city's tears by rigid faith
Imperious called, and honour's dire command.
Scipio, the gentle chief, humanely brave,
Who soon the race of spotless glory ran;
And, warm in youth, to the poetic shade,
With friendship and philosophy retired.
Tully, whose powerful eloquence a while
Restrained the rapid fate of rushing Rome.
Unconquered Cato, virtuous in extreme.
And thou, unhappy Brutus, kind of heart,
Whose steady arm, by awful virtue urged,
Lifted the Roman steel against thy friend.
Thousands, besides, the tribute of a verse
Demand; but who can count the stars of Heaven?

1 Servius Tullius, the sixth king of Rome; the founder of the Roman constitution.

2 Marcus Furius Camillus, several times chosen dictator of Rome. He captured Rome from the Gauls, who had taken and sacked it. He died of the plague B.C. 365.

3 Fabricius, consul of Rome, 283 B. C. He was sent to King Pyrrhus to treat of the ransom of prisoners, when the king's physician offered Fabricius to poison his master for a sum of money. Fabricius arrested him, and sent him in fetters to Pyrrhus.

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4 Twice appointed dictator. the first case he triumphed over the Equi, and resigned his office in ten days. He was chosen a second time at the age of eighty, to oppose the alleged machinations of Spurius Mælius.

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5 Marcus Atilius Regulus, celebrated for his military exploits against the Carthaginians. He was taken prisoner by Xantippus. Being sent to Rome to negotiate for the ransom of prisoners, he secretly advised the senate to refuse the terms. He returned to Carthage and there died.

6 Scipio Africanus, one of the greatest men of Rome; celebrated for his humanity and honourable conduct. 7 See note 5, p. 418.

8 Cato, surnamed Uticensis, from Utica, the place of his death. Born B.C. 95. He put himself to death, B.C. 46, rather than fall into the hands of Julius Cæsar.

9 M. Junius Brutus, the friend, and afterwards assassin, of Julius Cæsar. Born, B.C. 85. Died, B. c. 42.

Who sing their influence on this lower world?
Behold, who yonder comes! in sober state,

Fair, mild, and strong, as is a vernal sun :
'Tis Phoebus'1 self, or else the Mantuan Swain !2
Great Homer too, appears, of daring wing,
Parent of song! and equal by his side,

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The British Muse; joined hand in hand they walk,
Darkling, full up the middle steep to fame.

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Nor absent are those shades whose skilful touch
Pathetic drew the impassioned heart, and charmed
Transported Athens with the moral scene3,

Nor those who, tuneful, waked the enchanting lyre.
First of your kind! society divine!

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Still visit thus my nights, for you reserved,

And mount my soaring soul to thoughts like yours.
Silence, thou lonely power! the door be thine;
See on the hallowed hour that none intrude,
Save a few chosen friends, who sometimes deign
To bless my humble roof, with sense refined,
Learning digested well, exalted faith,
Unstudied wit, and humour ever gay.
Or from the Muses' hill will Pope descend,
To raise the sacred hour, to bid it smile,

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And with the social spirit warm the heart:

For though not sweeter his own Homer sings,

Yet is his life the more endearing song.

Where art thou, Hammond ?4 thou, the darling pride,

The friend, and lover of the tuneful throng?

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Ah why, dear youth, in all the blooming prime

Of vernal genius, where disclosing fast

Each active worth, each manly virtue lay,

Why wert thou ravished from our hope so soon?

What now avails that noble thirst of fame,

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Which stung thy fervent breast? that treasured store

Of knowledge, early gained? that eager zeal
Of youthful patriots, who sustain her name?
What now, alas! that life-diffusing charm
Of sprightly wit? that rapture for the muse,
That heart of friendship, and that soul of joy,
Which bade with softest light thy virtue smile?

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4 Antony Hammond, the author of some elegiac poetry of but moderate merit. He died, 1742.

Ah! only showed, to check our fond pursuits,
And teach our humble hopes that life is vain!
Thus in some deep retirement would I pass
The winter glooms with friends of pliant soul,
Or blithe, or solemn, as the theme inspired :

With them would search, if Nature's boundless frame
Was called late-rising from the void of night,
Or sprung eternal from the Eternal Mind,
Its life, its laws, its progress, and its end.
Hence larger prospects of the beauteous whole
Would, gradual, open on our opening minds;
And each diffusive harmony unite

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In full perfection to the astonished eye.
Then would we try to scan the moral world;
Which, though to us it seems embroiled, moves on
In higher order-fitted and impelled

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By wisdom's finest hand, and issuing all
In general good. The sage historic muse

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Should next conduct us through the deeps of time :
Show us how empire grew, declined, and fell,
In scattered states; what makes the nations smile,
Improves their soil, and gives them double suns;
And why they pine beneath the brightest skies,
In Nature's richest lap. As thus we talked,
Our hearts would burn within us, would inhale
That portion of divinity, that ray

Of purest Heaven, which lights the public soul
Of patriots, and of heroes. But if doomed,
In powerless humble fortune, to repress
These ardent risings of the kindling soul—

Then, even superior to ambition, we

Would learn the private virtues; how to glide

Through shades and plains, along the smoothest stream

Of rural life; or snatched away by hope,

Through the dim spaces of futurity,

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With earnest eye anticipate those scenes

Of happiness and wonder-where the mind,

In endless growth and infinite ascent,

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Rises from state to state, and world to world.

But, when with these the serious thought is foiled,

We, shifting for relief, would play the shapes

Of frolic fancy; and incessant form

Those rapid pictures, that assembled train

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Of fleet ideas, never joined before,

Whence lively Wit excites to gay surprise.
Or folly-painting Humour, grave himself,
Calls Laughter forth, deep-shaking every nerve.
Meantime, the village rouses up the fire:
While, well-attested, and as well-believed,
Heard solemn, goes the goblin story round,
Till superstitious horror creeps o'er all.
Or, frequent in the sounding hall, they wake
The rural gambol. Rustic mirth goes round;
The simple joke that takes the shepherd's heart,
Easily pleased; the long loud laugh, sincere;
The kiss, snatched hasty from the sidelong maid,
On purpose guardless, or pretending sleep;
The leap, the slap, the haul; and, shook to notes
Of native music, the respondent dance.

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Thus jocund fleets with them the winter night.

The city swarms intense. The public haunt,

Full of each theme, and warmed with mixed discourse,

Hums indistinct. The sons of riot flow

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Down the loose stream of false enchanted joy,

To swift destruction. On the rankled soul
The gaming fury falls; and in one gulf
Of total ruin, honour, virtue, peace,
Friends, families, and fortune, headlong sink.
Up springs the dance along the lighted dome,
Mixed, and evolved, a thousand sprightly ways.
The glittering court effuses every pomp;
The circle deepens: beamed from gaudy robes,
Tapers, and sparkling gems, and radiant eyes,
A soft effulgence o'er the palace waves:

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While, a gay insect in his summer shine,

The fop, light fluttering, spreads his mealy wings.
Dread o'er the scene, the ghost of Hamlet stalks;

Othello rages; poor Monimia1 mourns;

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And Belvidera 2 pours her soul in love.

Terror alarms the breast; the comely tear

Steals o'er the cheek: or else the comic Muse

Holds to the world a picture of itself,
And raises sly the fair impartial laugh.

Sometimes she lifts her strain, and paints the scenes

1 A character in "The Distressed Mother."

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2 A character in Otway's play of

"Venice Preserved."

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Of beauteous life; whate'er can deck mankind,
Or charm the heart, in generous Bevil1 showed.
O thou, whose wisdom, solid, yet refined,
Whose patriot virtues, and consummate skill
To touch the finer springs that move the world,
Joined to whate'er the Graces can bestow,
And all Apollo's animating fire,

Give thee, with pleasing dignity, to shine
At once the guardian, ornament, and joy
Of polished life-permit the rural Muse,
O Chesterfield 2, to grace thee with her song!
Ere to the shades again she humbly flies,
Indulge her fond ambition, in thy train,
(For every Muse has in thy train a place)
To mark thy various full-accomplished mind,
To mark that spirit, which, with British scorn,
Rejects the allurements of corrupted power;
That elegant politeness, which excels
Even in the judgment of presumptuous France,
The boasted manners of her shining court;
That wit, the vivid energy of sense,

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The truth of nature, which, with Attic point,

And kind, well-tempered satire, smoothly keen,
Steals through the soul, and without pain corrects.

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Or, rising thence with yet a brighter flame,
O, let me hail thee on some glorious day,
When to the listening Senate, ardent crowd
Britannia's sons to hear her pleaded cause.
Then drest by thee, more amiably fair,

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Truth the soft robe of mild persuasion wears:

Thou to assenting reason giv'st again

Her own enlightened thoughts; called from the heart,

The obedient passions on thy voice attend;

And even reluctant party feels awhile

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Thy gracious power-as though the varied maze

Of eloquence, now smooth, now quick, now strong,
Profound and clear, you roll the copious flood.

To thy loved haunt return, my happy Muse; For now, behold, the joyous winter days, Frosty succeed; and through the blue serene,

1 A character in "The Conscious Lovers," written by Sir Richard Steele.

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2 Philip Dormer Stanhope, Lord Chesterfield, born 1694, died 1773, known for his "Letters to his Son."