SERENATA FOR TWO VOICES,
ON THE MARRIAGE OF THE
IN LIBRO PRIMO EPISTOLARUM.
RIGHT HON. THE LORD COBHAM TO MRS. DIMIDIUM facti, qui cœpit, habet. Sapere aude:
Fair Honour, next in beauty and in grace,
Shines in her turn, and claims the second place;
She fills the well-born soul with noble fires,
And generous thoughts and godlike acts inspires.
Then Honesty, with native air, succeeds,
Plain is her look, unartful are her deeds;
And, just alike to friends and foes, she draws
The bounds of right and wrong, nor errs from equal
laws.
From Heaven this scale of virtue thus descends
By just degrees, and thy full choice defends.
So when, in visionary trains, by night
Attending angels bless'd good Jacob's sight,
The mystic ladder thus appear'd to rise,
Its foot on earth, its summit in the skies.
SUNG BY THE CHILDREN OF CHRIST'S HOSPITAL, AT THE
ENTRY OF KING GEORGE
INTO LONDON, 1714.
HEAR US, O God, this joyful day!
Whole nations join their voice,
To thee united thanks to pay,
And in thy strength rejoice.
For led by thee, O King of Kings!
Our sovereign George we see;
Thy hand the royal blessing brings,
He comes, he reigns, by thee!
Plenteous of grace, pour from above
Thy favours on his head;
Truth, Mercy, Righteousness, and Love,
As guards around him spread.
With length of days, and glory crown'd,
With wealth and fair increase, Let him abroad be far renown'd, Still blest at home with peace.
TO THE MEMORY OF
MRS. ELIZABETH HUGHES,
LATE WIFE OF
EDWARD HUGHES, ESQ.
OF HERTINGFORDBURY, IN THE COUNTY OF HERTFORD,
AND DAUGHTER OF RICHARD HARRISON, ESQ.
BALLS, IN THE SAME COUNTY.
SEE! how those dropping monuments decay!
Frail mansions of the silent dead,
Whose souls, to uncorrupting regions fled,
With a wise scorn their mouldering dust survey.
Their tombs are rais'd from dust as well as they;
For see! to dust they both return,
And Time consumes alike the ashes and the urn.
We ask the sculptor's art in vain
To make us for a space ourselves survive;
In Parian stone we proudly breathe again,
Or seem in figur'd brass to live.
Yet stone and brass our hopes betray,
Age steals the mimic forms and characters away,
In vain, O Egypt, to the wondering skies,
With giant pride, thy pyramids arise;
Whate'er their vast and gloomy vaults contain,
No names distinct of their great dead remain.
Beneath the mass confus'd, in heaps thy monarchs
[lie,
Unknown, and blended in mortality.
To Death ourselves and all our works we owe.
But is there nought, O Muse, can save
Our memories from darkness and the grave,
And some short after-life bestow?
"That task is mine," the Muse replies,
And, hark! she tunes the sacred lyre!
Verse is the last of human works that dies,
When Virtue does the song inspire.
Then look, Eliza, happy saint, look down!
Pause from immortal joys awhile
To hear, and gracious, with a smile,
The dedicated numbers own;
Say, how in thy life's scanty space,
So short a space, so wondrous bright,
Bright as a summer's day, short as a summer's night,
Could'st thou find room for every crowded grace?
As if thy thrifty soul foreknew,
Like a wise envoy, Heaven's intent,
Soon to recall whom it had sent,
And all its task resolv'd at once to do.
Or wert thou but a traveller below,
That hither didst awhile repair,
Curious our customs and our laws to know?
And, sickening in our grosser air,
And tir'd of vain repeated sights,
Our foolish cares, our false delights,
Back to thy native seats would'st go?
Oh! since to us thou wilt no more return,
Permit thy friends, the faithful few,
Who best thy numerous virtues knew,
Themselves, not thee, to mourn.
Now, pensive Muse, enlarge thy flight!
(By turns the pensive Muses love
The hilly heights and shady grove)
Behold where, swelling to the sight,
Balls, a fair structure, graceful stands!
And from yon verdant rising brow
Sees Hertford's ancient town, and lands,
Where Nature's hand, in slow meanders, leads
The Lee's clear stream its course to flow
Through flowery vales, and moisten'd meads,
And far around in beauteous prospects spreads
Her map of plenty all below.
'Twas here and sacred be the spot of earth! Eliza's soul, born first above,
Descended to an humbler birth,
And with a mortal's frailties strove.
So, on some towering peak that meets the sky,
When missive Seraphs downward fly,
They stop, and for awhile alight,
Put off their rays celestial-bright,
Then take some milder form familiar to our eye.
Swiftly her infant virtues grew :
Water'd by Heaven's peculiar care,
Her morning bloom was doubly fair,
Like Summer's day break, when we see
The fresh-dropp'd stores of rosy dew
(Transparent beautics of the dawn)
Spread o'er the grass their cobweb-lawn,
ALLUSION TO HORACE APOLLO AND DAPHNE.
Or hang moist pearls on every tree.
Pleas'd with the lovely sight, awhile
Her friends behold, and joyful smile,
Nor think the Sun's exhaling ray
Will change the scene ere noon of day,
Dry up the glistering drops, and draw those dews
Yet first, to fill her orb of life,
Behold, in each relation dear,
The pious saint, the duteous child appear,
The tender sister, and the faithful wife.
Alas! but must one circlet of the year
Unite in bliss, in grief divide
The destin'd bridegroom and the bride? Stop, generous youth, the gathering tear, That, as you read these lines or hear, Perhaps may start, and seem to say, "That short-liv'd year was but a day!" Forbear-nor fruitless sorrowings now employ, Think she was lent awhile, not given, (Such was th' appointed will of Heaven), Then, grateful, call that year an age of virtuous joy.
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Send me to Whigs as true and hearty,
As ever pity'd poor Maccarty;
Let Townshend, Sunderland, be there,
Or Robin Walpole in the chair;
Or send me to a club of Tories,
That dann and curse at Marlborough's glories.
And drink-but sure none such there are!-
The Devil, the pope, and rebel Mar;
Yet still my loyalty I'll boast,
King George shall ever be my toast;
Unbrib'd his glorious cause I'll own,
And fearless scorn each traitor's frown.
O SAY, ye saints, who shine in realms above,
And tune your harps to sing eternal love,
When shall my voice attain your high degree;
When shall my soul, from clouds of sorrow free,
Hear your celestial song, and aid the harmony?
PRINTED AT THE BREAKING OUT OF THE REBELLION IN THE YEAR 1715.
THE man that loves his king and nation,
And shuns each vile association,
That trusts his honest deeds i' th' light,
Nor meets in dark cabals, by night,
With fools, who, after much debate,
Get themselves hang'd, and save the state,
Needs not his hall with weapons store;
Nor dreads each rapping at his door;
Nor sculks, in fear of being known,
Or hides his guilt in parson's gown;
Nor wants, to guard his generous heart,
The poniard or the poison'd dart;
And, but for ornament and pride,
A sword of lath might cross his side.
If o'er St. James's park he stray,
He stops not, pausing in his way;
Nor pulls his hat down o'er his face,
Nor starts, looks back, and mends his pace:
Or if he ramble to the Tower,
He knows no crime, and dreads no power,
But thence returning, free as wind,
Smiles at the bars he left behind.
Thus, as I loiter'd t' other day,
Humming-O every month was May-
And, thoughtless how my time I squander'd,
From Whitehall, through the Cockpit wander'd,
A messenger with surly eye
View'd me quite round, and yet pass'd by.
No sharper look or rougher mien
In Scottish highlands e'er was seen;
Nor ale and brandy ever bred
More pimpled cheeks, or nose more red;
And yet, with both hands in my breast,
Careless I walk'd, nor shunn'd the beast.
Place me among a hundred spies,
Let all the room be ears and eyes;
Or search my pocket-books and papers,
No word or line shall give me vapours.
Behold again to her I bow,
Devoted ever to remain
A virgin of her spotless train;
Hear, Cynthia, and confirm my vow.
How happy are we,
How airy, how free,
That rove through the woods and the plains! In vain the blind boy
Our hearts would decoy,
We scorn all his joys and his pains.
Though heav'n, and earth, and ocean spreads; [Exit Daphne. Thou art thyself the happiest child of Love,
What hast thou sworn?
With thee shall Peneus' race expire?
Then hear once more thy slighted sire,
And know, thy fatal vow draws down
The curse of Heaven, a father's frown,
And sure destruction waits thy scorn.
Feeble Cupid! vain deceiver!
What avails thy boasted quiver?
Where are all thy conquering arts?
They that fly thee
May defy thee;
They who fear thee,
Do not thy birth disclaim.
Ever meet thy keenest darts.
Your faithful swain.
No longer try me,
For ever fly me,
Despairing swain.
Yet hear me.
Forbear me.
Let sighs imploring,
And looks adoring,
Still speak my pain. Your sighs imploring, And looks adoring,
But move disdain.
She's gone-nor knows from whom she flies.
Mistaken coyness! false disdain !
Phoebus she prais'd, but scorns the swain-
Then, breaking from this dark disguise,
When Phoebus what he is shall seem,
My glittering rays, and melting lyre,
At last shall warm thee to desire,
And wake thee, Daphne, from thy dream
Where Cupid's bow is failing,
Ambition's charms prevailing,
Shall triumph o'er the fair.
The nymph that love despises,
Some secret passion prizes,
That still forbids despair.
Doris, why this trifling tale?
That good advice may once prevail; Save one-nor all your lovers lose, Alas! that I, poor I might gain What you each day refuse!
Daphne, on Phoebus fix thy eye,
With meaner shapes deceiv'd no more!
Know, I thy beauteous form adore:
Wilt thou a god, a god that loves thee, fly?
[Apollo strikes his lyre, and Daphne turns back
as surprised at the sound.]
Fairest mortal! stay and hear,
Turn thee, leave thy trembling fear!
Cannot Love with Music join'd
Touch thy unrelenting mind?
Fairest mortal! stay and hear,
Turn thee, leave thy trembling fear.
Hark how the river-shores prolong
My soft complaints, and murmur to my song!
Thy father Peneus feels my pain;
See! how his osiers gently bow,
And seem my secret soul to know-
DAPH. [aside.] Alas! my rash, my fatal vow!
APOL. Wilt thou alone unmov'd remain?
[As Daphne is going out, she stops and sings
the following air,
Dost thou not know,
I'm of Diana's train?
Thy love forbear—
Thy scorn forbear-
I must not hear:
O stay and hear;
APOL. Thy flight is vain.
[Exit Daphne pursued by Apollo.
SCENE CHANGES TO THE RIVER.
Re-enter Daphne, looking back as affrighted.
He comes the swift pursuer comes-O where
Shall I escape his piercing sight,
Where hide ine from the god of light?
Ah! 'tis in vain-he's here.
[Daphne runs to the side of the river, and as
she sings the following air is transformed
into a laurel-tree.]
Father Peneus, bear me, aid me!
Let some sudden change invade me,
Fix me rooted on thy shore.
Cease, Apollo, to persuade me,
I am Daphne now no more.→→
[Apollo enters at the latter end of the air,
and is met by Peneus.]
O fatal flight!-O curst disdain!
O Peneus, how shall we our loss deplore;
The trembling branches yet her shape retain!
Though Daphne lives a nymph no more,
She lives, fair verdant plant, in thee:
Henceforth be thou Apollo's tree,
And hear what honours to thy leaves remain.
No thunder e'er shall blast thy boughs,
Preserv'd to grace Apollo's brows,
Kings, victors, poets, to adorn ;
Oft in Britannia's isle thy prosperous green
Shall on the heads of her great chiefs be seen,
And by a Nassau, and a George, be worn.
Still Peneus, with a father's care,
Shall feed thee from his flowing urn
With verdure ever fresh and fair,
Nor this thy destin'd change shall mourn.
CHORUS, OR DUETTO OF APOLLO AND PENEUS,
Nature alone can love inspire,
Art is vain to move desire.
If Nature once the fair incline,
To their own passion they resign.
Nature alone can love inspire,
Art is vain to move desire.
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