Why should'st thou here look for perpetual good,
At every loss against heav'n's face repining?
Do but behold where glorious cities stood,

With gilded tops, and silver turrets shining;

There now the hart fearless of greyhound feeds,
And loving pelican in safety breeds;

There shrieking satyrs fill the people's empty steads.

Where is th' Assyrian lion's golden hide*,
That all the east once grasp'd in lordly paw?
Where that great Persian bear, whose swelling pride
The lion's self tore out with ravenous jaw?

Or he which 'twixt a lion and a pard,

Through all the world with nimble pinions far'd, And to his greedy whelps his conquer'd kingdoms shar'd?

Hardly the place of such antiquity,

Or note of these great monarchies, we find:
Only a fading verbal memory,

And empty name in writ, is left behind:

But when this second life and glory fades,

And sinks at length in time's obscurer shades, A second fall succeeds, and double death invades.

That monstrous beast, which, nurs'd in Tiber's fen,
Did all the world with hideous shape affray;

* Where is th' Assyrian lion's golden hide, &c.] Thus, Spenser, in The Ruines of Time:

What now is of th' Assyrian lioness,

Of whom no footing now on earth appears?
What of the Persian bear's outrageousness,
Whose memory is quite worn out with years?
Who of the Grecian libbard now ought hears,

That overran the East with greedy power,
And left his whelps their kingdoms to devour?

Hughes's Edit. p. 9.

That fill'd with costly spoil his gaping den,
And trod down all the rest to dust and clay :

His batt'ring horns, pull'd out by civil hands,
And iron teeth, lie scatter'd on the sands;
Back'd, bridled by a monk with seven heads yoked stands.

And that black vulture, which with deathful wing
O'ershadows half the earth*, whose dismal sight
Frighted the muses from their native spring,
Already stoops, and flags with weary flight,

Who then shall hope for happiness beneath;

Where each new day proclaims chance, change, and death, And life itself's as flit as is the air we breathe?

Purple Island, by P. Fletcher,
Cant. VII. St. 2-7.

*And that black vulture, which with deathful wing

O'ershadows half the earth.] Mr. Hayley, in his Essay on History, has a very bold and magnificent image of this kind. He is about to describe Livy:

Of mightier spirit, of majestic frame;

With powers proportion'd to the Roman fame,
When Rome's fierce eagle his broad wings unfurl'd,
And shadow'd with his plumes the subject world
In bright pre-eminence, &c.

Ep. I.

VOL. II.

FAITH.

THE proudest pitch of that victorious spirit
Was but to win the world, whereby t' inherit
The airy purchase of a transitory
And glozing title of an age's glory;

Would'st thou by conquest win more fame than he,
Subdue thyself; thyself's a world to thee..
Earth's but a ball, that heaven hath quilted o'er
With Wealth and Honour, banded on the floor
Of fickle Fortune's false and slippery court,
Sent for a toy, to make us children sport,
Man's satiate spirits with fresh delights supplying,
To still the fondlings of the world from crying;
And he, whose merit mounts to such a joy,
Gains but the honour of a mighty toy.

But would'st thou conquer, have thy conquest crown'd By hands of Seraphims, triumph'd with the sound

Of heaven's loud trumpet, warbled by the shrill
Celestial quire, recorded with a quill

Pluck'd from the pinion of an angel's wing,
Confirm'd with joy by heaven's eternal king;
Conquer thyself, thy rebel thoughts repel,
And chace those false affections that rebel.

Hath heaven despoil'd what his full hand hath given thee?
Nipp'd thy succeeding blossoms? or bereaven thee

Of thy dear latest hope, thy bosom friend?
Doth sad Despair deny these griefs an end?
Despair's a whisp'ring rebel, that within thee,
Bribes all thy field, and sets thyself again' thee:

Make keen thy faith, and with thy force let flee,
If thou not conquer him, he'll conquer thee:
Advance thy shield of Patience to thy head,

And when Grief strikes, 'twill strike the striker dead.
* In adverse fortunes, be thou strong and stout,

And bravely win thyself, heaven holds not out
His bow for ever bent; the disposition
Of noblest spirit doth, by opposition,
Exasperate the more: a gloomy night

Whets on the morning to return more bright;
+ Brave minds, oppress'd, should in despite of Fate,
Look greatest, like the sun, in lowest state ‡.
But, ah! shall God thus strive with flesh and blood?
Receives he glory from, or reaps he good

In mortals' ruin, that he leaves man so
To be o'erwhelm'd by this unequal foe?

May not a potter, that, from out the ground,
Hath fram'd a vessel, search if it be sound?
Or if, by furbishing, he take more pain
To make it fairer, shall the pot complain?
Mortal, thou art but clay; then shall not he,
That fram'd thee for his service, season thee?
Man, close thy lips; be thou no undertaker
Of God's designs; dispute not with thy Maker.

Job Militant, by F. Quarles, Med. iii.

* Two lines are here omitted.

+ Two lines are here omitted.

Brave minds, opprest, should in despite of fate

Look greatest, like the sun, in lowest state.] Blair has the same thought in his fine poem, The Grave, speaking of the death of the just man:

By unperceiv'd degrees he wears away,

Yet, like the sun, seems larger at his setting.

TO THE

HONOURABLE MR. W. E—

E who is good is happy; let the loud
Artillery of heaven break through a cloud,
And dart its thunder at him; he'll remain
Unmov'd, and nobler comfort entertain

In welcoming the approach of death, than vice
Ere found,in her fictitious paradise.

Time mocks our youth, and (while we number past
Delights, and raise our appetite to taste

Ensuing) brings us to unflatter'd age*,
Where we are left to satisfy the rage

Of threat'ning Death: pomp, beauty, wealth, and all
Our friendships, shrinking from the funeral.

The thought of this begets that brave disdain

With which thou view'st the world, and makes those vain

Treasures of fancy, serious fools so court,

And sweat to purchase, thy contempt or sport.
What should we covet here? why interpose

A cloud 'twixt us and heaven? kind nature chose

Man's soul th' Exchequer where she'd hoard her wealth,
And lodge all her rich secrets; but by the stealth
Of our own vanity, w' are left so poor,
The creature merely sensual knowes more.
The learned Halcyon by her wisdom finds
A gentle season, when the seas and winds

unflatter'd age.] A very original epithet.