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So little company, you say,

Yet fond of home from day to day!
How do you fhun Detraction's rod ?
I doubt your neighbours think you odd!

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You feem regardless of the town:
Pray, Sir, how ftand you with the gown?

CONTENT.

The clergy fay they love me well;
Whether they do, they best can tell :
They paint me modeft, friendly, wife,
And always praise me to the skies;
But if conviction's at the heart,
Why not a correspondent part?
For shall the learned tongue prevail,
If actions preach a diff'rent tale ?
Who'll feek my door, and grace my walls,
When neither dean nor prelate calls?

With those my friendships moft obtain,
Who prize their duty more than gain;
Soft flow the hours whene'er we meet,
And confcious virtue is our treat;
Our harmless breasts no envy know,
And hence we fear no fecret foe;
Our walks Ambition ne'er attends,
And hence we ask no pow'rful friends;
We wish the best to church and state,
But leave the fteerage to the great ;
Careless, who rises, or who falls,
And never dream of vacant stalls:

Much

Much lefs, by pride or int'reft drawn,
Sigh for the mitre, and the lawn.
Obferve the secrets of my art,
I'll fundamental truths impart :
If you'll my kind advice purfue,
I'll quit my hut, and dwell with you,
The paffions are a num'rous crowd,
Imperious, pofitive, and loud;
Curb thefe licentious fons of strife;
Hence chiefly rife the ftorms of life:
If they grow mutinous, and raye,
They are thy mafters, thou their slave.
Regard the world with cautious eye,
Nor raise your expectation high.
See that the balanc'd scales be fuch,
You neither fear nor hope too much:
For disappointment's not the thing;'
'I'is pride and paffion point the fting,
Life is a fea, where ftorms must rise;
'Tis Folly talks of cloudless fkies:
He who contracts his fwelling fail,
Eludes the fury of the gale.

Be ftill, nor anxious thoughts employ,

Diftruft embitters prefent joy:

On God for all events depend;

You cannot want when God's your friend.

Weigh well your part, and do

your best;

Leave to your Maker all the rest.

The Hand which form'd thee in the womb,

Guides from the cradle to the tomb.

Can the fond mother flight her boy;
Can fhe forget her prattling joy?
Say, then, fhall Sov'reign Love defert
The humble, and the honeft heart?
Heav'n may not grant thee all thy mind;
Yet fay not thou that Heav'n's unkind,

God

God is alike, both good and wife,
In what he grants, and what denies :
Perhaps, what Goodness gives to-day,
To-morrow Goodness takes away. {
You fay, that troubles intervene,
That forrows darken half the scene.
True-and this confequence you fee,
The world was ne'er defign'd for thee
You're like a paffenger below,
That ftays perhaps a night or fo;
But still his native country lies
Beyond the bound'ries of the skies.

Of Heav'n afk virtue, wisdom, health,
But never let thy pray'r be wealth.
If food be thine, (tho' little gold)
And raiment to repel the cold;
Such as may Nature's wants fuffice,
Not what from pride and folly rife;
If foft the motions of thy foul,

And a calm confcience crowns the whole;
Add but a friend to all this store,

You can't in reafon wifh for more:

And if kind Heav'n this comfort brings, 'Tis more than Heav'n beftows on kings.

He fpake the airy fpectre flies,
And ftraight the fweet illufion dies.
The vifion, at the early dawn,
Confign'd me to the thoughtful morn;
To all the cares of waking clay, ·
And inconsistent dreams of day,

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HAPPINESS.

Y

HAPPINESS.

VISION V.

E ductile youths, whofe rifing fun
Hath many circles still to run;
Who wifely with the pilot's chart,
To fteer thro' life th' unfteady heart;
And all the thoughtful voyage paft,
To gain a happy port at last :
Attend a Seer's inftructive song,
For moral truths to dreams belong.

I faw this wond'rous vifion foon,
Long ere my fun had reach'd it's noon;
Juft when the rifing beard began
To grace my chin, and call me man.

One night, when balmy flumbers fhed
Their peaceful poppies o'er my head,
My fancy led me to explore

A thoufand fcenes unknown before.
I faw a plain extended wide,

And crowds pour'd in from ev'ry fide;
All feem'd to start a diff'rent game,
Yet all declar'd their views the fame :
The chace was Happiness, I found;
But all, alas! enchanted ground.

Indeed, I judg'd it wond'rous strange;
To fee the giddy numbers range.

Thro' roads, which promis'd nought, at best,
But forrow to the human breaft.
Methought, if blifs was all their view,
Why did they diff'rent paths pursue ?
The waking world has long agreed,
That Bagshot's not the road to Tweed:

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And he who Berwick feeks thro' Staines,
Shall have his labour for his pains.

As Parnell fays, my bofom wrought
With travail of uncertain thought;
And, as an angel help'd the dean,
My angel chofe to intervene :

The dress of each was much the fame,
And Virtue was my feraph's name.
When thus the angel filence broke;
Her voice was mufick as the fpoke.

Attend, O man! nor leave my fide,
And fafety shall thy footsteps guide;
Such truths I'll teach, fuch fecrets fhow,
As none but favour'd mortals know.'
She faid-and ftraight we march'd along
To join Ambition's active throng:
Crowds urg'd on crowds, with eager pace,
And happy he who led the race.
Axes and daggers lay unfeen
In ambuscade along the green;
While vapours fhed delufive light,
And bubbles mock'd the diftant fight.
We faw a fhining mountain rife,
Whofe tow'ring fummit reach'd the fkies;
The flopes were steep, and form'd of glass,
Painful and hazardous to pass:

Courtiers and statesmen led the way;
The faithless paths their steps betray;
This moment seen aloft to soar,
The next to fall, and rife no more.

'Twas here Ambition kept her court,

A phantom of gigantick port:
The fav'rite that fuftain'd her throne,
Was Falfhood, by her vizard known;

* See the Hermit.

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