His coat, an usurer's velvet pall,
Bequeath'd to Pluto, corpse and all.
But, loth his person to expose
Bare, like a carcase pickt by crows,
A lawyer o'er his hands and face
Stuck artfully a parchment-case.

Thus furnished out, he sent his train To take a house in Warwick-lane: The faculty," his humble friends, A complimental message sends : Their president in scarlet gown Harangu'd, and welcom'd him to town.

But Death had business to dispatch; His mind was running on his match, And, hearing much of Daphne's fame, His majesty of terrors" came, Fine as a colonel of the guards, To visit where she sate at cards: She, as he came into the room, 'Fhought him Adonis in his bloom. And now her heart with pleasure jumps She scarce remembers what is trumps; For such a shape of skin and bone Was never seen, except her own: Charm'd with his eyes, and chin, and snout, Her pocket-glass drew slily out;

And grew enamour'd with her phiz,

As just the counterpart of his.

She darted many a private glance,
And freely made the first advance;
Was of her beauty grown so vain,
She doubted not to win the swain.

Nothing she thought could sooner gain him,
Than with her wit to entertain him.
She ask'd about her friends below;
'This meagre fop, that batter'd beau:
Whether some late departed toasts
Had got gallants among the ghosts?
if Chloe were a sharper still
As great as ever at quadrille ?

(The ladies there must needs be rooks;
For cards, we know, are Pluto's books!)
If Florimel had found her love,
For whom she hang'd herself above?
How oft' a week was kept a ball
By Proserpine at Pluto's hall?
She fancied those Elysian shades
The sweetest place for masquerades:
How pleasant, on the banks of Styx,
To troil it in a coach and six!

What pride a female heart inflames!
How endless are ambition's aims!
Cease, haughty nymph; the Fates decree
Death must not be a spouse for thee:
For, when by chance the meagre shade
Upon thy hand his finger laid,

Thy hand as dry and cold as lead,
His matrimonial spirit fled;
He felt about his heart a damp,
That quite extinguish'd Cupid's lamp:
Away the frighted spectre scuds,
And leaves my lady in the suds.

PARALLELS.

How beautiful is night!

MILTON.

As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night! O'er heav'n's clear azure spreads her sacred light, When not a breath disturbs the deep serene, And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene; Around her throne the vivid planets roll, And stars unnumber'd gild the glowing pole, O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed, And tip with silver ev'ry mountain's head; Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise, A flood of glory bursts from all the skies: The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight, Eye the blue vauit, and bless the useful light. POPE'S HOMER.

• Ut ftudiis fperem, aut aufim par effe querelis,
Non mihi forte datum; lenti feu fanguinis obfint
Frigora, seu nimium longo jacuiffe veterno,
Sive mihi mentem dederit natura minorem.

Te fterili functum cura, vocumque falebris
Tuto eluctatum fpatiis fapientia dia
Excipit æthereis, ars omnis plaudit amico,
Linguarumque omni terra difcordia concors
Multiplici reducem circum fonatore magiftrum.
Me, penfi immunis cum jam mihi reddor, inertis
Defidiæ fors dura manet, graviorque labore
Trials et atra quies, et tardæ tædia vitæ.
Nafcuntur curis curæ, vexatque dolorum
Importuna cohors, vacuæ mala fomnia mentis.
Nunc clamofa juvant nocturnæ gaudia menfæ,
Nunc loca fola placent; fruftra te, Somne, re
cumbens

Alme voco, impatiens noctis metuensque diei.
Omnia percurro trepidus, circum omnia luftro,
Si qua ufquam pateat melioris femita vitæ,
Nec quid agam invenio, meditatus grandia, cogor
Notior ipfe mihi fieri, incultumque fateri
Pectus et ingenium vano fe robore jactans.
Ingenium nifi materiem doctrina miniftrat,
Ceffat inops rerum, ut torpet, fi marmoris abfit
Copia, Phidiaci fæcunda potentia cœli.
Quicquid agam, quocunque ferar, conatibus
obftat

Res angufta domi, et macræ penuria mentis.

Non rationis opes animus, nunc parta recenfens Confpicit aggeftas, et fe miratur in illis, Nec fibi de gaza præfans quod poftulat ufus Summus adeffe jubet celfa dominator ab arce; Non operum ferie feriem dum computat ævi, Præteritis fruitur, lætos aut fumit honores Ipfe fui judex, a&tæ bene munera vitæ ; Sed fua regna videns, loca nocte filentia late Horret, ubi vanæ fpecies, umbræque fugaces, Et rerum volitant raræ per inane figuræ.

Quid faciam tenebrifne pigram damnare se.

nectam

Reftat? an accingar ftudiis gravioribus audax? Aut hoc, fi nimium eft, tandem nova lexica pofcam?

The drudgery of words the damn'd would know, Doom'd to write Lexicons in endless woe.*

Yes, you had cause, great Genius, to repent ; "You loft good days that might be better spent ; You well might grudge the hours of ling'ring pain, And view your learned labours with disdain. To you were giv'n the large expanded mind, The flame of genius, and the tafte refin'd. 'Twas yours on eagle wings aloft to foar, And amidit rolling worlds the Great Firft Caufe explore;

To fix the æras of recorded time,

And live in ev'ry age, in ev'ry clime;

Record the chiefs, who propt their country's caufe ;

Who founded empires, and establish'd laws;
To learn whate'er the fage with virtue fraught,
Whate'er the muse of moral wisdom taught.
These were your quarry; thefe to you were
known,

And the world's ample volume was your own.

Yet warn'd by me, ye pigmy wits, beware, Nor with immortal Scaliger compare. For me, though his example ftrike my view, Oh! not for me his footfleps to pursue. Whether firit nature, unpropitious, cold, This clay compounded in a ruder mould; Or the flow current, loitʼring at my heart, No gleam of wit or fancy can impart ; Whate'er the cause, from me no numbers flow, No vifions warm me, and no raptures glow.

A mind like Scaliger's, fuperiour ftill,
No grief could conquer, no misfortune chill.
Though for the maze of words his native skies
He feem'd to quit, 'twas but again to rise;
To mount once more to the bright fource of day,
And view the wonders of th' ætherial way.
The love of fame his gen'rous bosom fir'd ;
Each science hail'd him, and each muse inspir'd.
For him the fons of learning trim'd the bays,
And nations grew harmonious in his praise.

My task perform'd, and all my labours o'er,
For me what lot has fortune now in ftore?
The liftlefs will fucceeds, that worst disease,
The rack of indolence, the sluggish ease.
Care grows on care, and o'er my aching brain
Black melancholy pours her morbid train.
No kind relief, no lenitive at hand,

I feek at midnight clubs, the foctal band;

But midnight clubs, where wit with noife confpires,

Where Comus revels, and where wine infpires,
Delight no more: I feek my lonely bed,
And call on fleep to foothe my languid head.
But fleep from thefe fad lids flies far away;
I mourn all night, and dread the coming day.
Exhaufted, tir'd, I throw my eyes around,
To find some vacant spot on claffick ground;
And foon, vain hope! I form a grand defign;
Languor fucceeds, and all my pow'rs decline.

197

ARTICLE 1.

[Concluded.]

Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Vol. I. 1805. 4to. pp. 564. PART II. PHYSICAL PAPERS.

I. Observations upon an hypothesis for solving the phenomena of light, with incidental observations, tending to shew the heterogeneous ness of light, and of the electrick fluid, by their intermixture, or union, with each other. By James Bowdoin, Esquire, President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

The celebrated Dr. Franklin observed, that he was much in the dark about light. And it must be acknowledged, that, notwithstanding the great progress we have made in opticks, many difficulties still remain relative to the nature of light, or the manner in which vis ion is produced. It is well known, that modern philosophers have proposed two hypotheses for the purpose of explaining this point. In one, adopted by Huygens, Euler, and some others, an extremely subtile, elastick fluid is supposed to penetrate all bodies, and to fill all space; and vibrations,being excited in it by the action of luminous bodies, are propagated to the eye, and produce in that organ the sensation of vision in the same manner, as pulsations of air produce in the organ of hearing the sensation of sound. According to the other

hypothesis, maintained by Sir Isaac Newton and others, light consists of particles of matter, extremely minute, which being projected or thrown off from luminous bodies in every direction by a repulsive force, and reflected by opaque bodies, produce the sensation of vision by impulse on the eye.

The hypothesis, on which the author of this Memoir remarks, is contained in some queries, proposed by Dr Franklin, and is in substance the same as the former of the two preceding; to which the observations may be considered as objections, or arguments in favor of the other.

In one part of the reasoning in form of queries relative to the production of light in various instances by motion, on supposition that the hypothesis of vibration is true, more seems to be assumed than is granted in the hypothesis. It does not appear to be inferable from Dr. Franklin's statement, nor from any other, that we recollect to have seen, that every kind and degree of motion in the elastick fluid is supposed or admitted to be productive of the sensation of vision; nor does this seem to be a necessary consequence. In the theory of sound, though the vibratory agency of the air is clearly ascertained, yet it is not supposed that every kind and degree of motion in the air produces the sensation of sound.

The author's ideas respecting the heterogeneousness of light and

of the electrick fluid may be well learned from the following extract, it being noted, that he uses fire in it as synomimous with light.

"Electricity and fire differ in many respects, and in some they agree; as hath been shewn in Dr. Franklin's letters on electricity. So far as they agree in their effects, their nature may be presumed to be alike or rather, from that agreement and similitude of effects, I think it may be inferred, that they are mixt with, and generally do accompany each other; and that each produces its own effect at the time of their joint operation. The effects of electricity, similar to those of fire, being produced by the fire mixt with it; and the effects of fire, resembling those of electricity, being produced by the clectricity mixt with that: the compound taking its name from the predominant principle."

Is it not more probable that one fluid, operating in different modes and circumstances, produces those different effects?

II.

Observations on light, and the waste of matter in the sun and fixt stars, occasioned by the constant efflux of light from them; with a conjecture, proposed by way of query, and suggesi, ing a mean, by which their several systems might be preserved from the disorder and final ruin, to which they seem liable by that evaste of matter, and by the law of gravitation. By James Bow doin, Esquire, President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Franklin had made some objections to the Newtonian doctrine of light on the ground, that there most consequently be a momentum or force in the particles

of light, and a waste in the matter of the sun, which do not accord with experience and observation. Mr. Bowdoin endeavours to remove these chjections. Accordingly the " Observations on Light" in the former part are calculated to show, that the inference relative to the motion or momentum of light is not just, and of course the objection, raised on it, unfounded. In the other part, after some good observations on the waste of matter in the sun by emission of light, the hypothesis is introduced, which is announced with so much modesty and caution in the title. The author,apparently well apprized of the difficulty of supporting it with evidence, merely proposes it as a query, or subject of consideration. That wonderful phenomenon, the ring of Saturn, which appears to the planet like a vast, surrounding, luminous arch, suggested the idea of conjecturing that a hollow sphere or orb might encompass the several systems, which compose the visible heavens. This surrounding orb is supposed to be fitted by its structure, and the properties of gravity, repulsion of light, &c. with which it is furnished to stop the rays of light, reflect them to the source, whence they emanated, and thus prevent loss or waste of any matter within it, and preserve the magnitude of the sun and stars; and also to serve as a counterbalance to the mutual gravities of the systems and bodies, inclosed by it, thus contributing to the preservation of their relative distances, and the prolongation of their regular motions.

The following remark shows, that the author was not insensible to the weight of objections. "To this hypothesis objections may be made, and such as might prove it to be, like many an one which has