3 Sage reflection, bent with years, Health that snuffs the morning air, 4 When all nature's hush'd asleep, Devotion lends her heav'n plum'd wings, Where never sun-burnt woodman came, Till the tuneful bird of night, Let them for their country bleed! What was Sidney's, Raleigh's meed? Man's not worth a moment's pain; Base, ungrateful, fickle, vain. 7 Then let me, sequester'd fair, To your sybil grot repair; On yon hanging cliff it stands, Scoop'd by nature's plastic hands, Bosom'd in the gloomy shade Of cypress not with age decayed; Where the owl still hooting sits, Where the bat incessant flits; There in loftier strains I'll sing Whence the changing seasons spring; Tell how storms deform the skies, Whence the waves subside and rise, Trace the comet's blazing tail, Weigh the planets in a scale; Bend, great God, before thy shrine; The bournless macrocosm's thine. 8 Since in each scheme of life I've fail'd, And disappointment seems entail'd; Since all on earth I valu'd most, My guide, my stay, my friend is lost; O Solitude, now give me rest, And hush the tempest in my breast. O gently deign to guide my feet To your hermit-trodden seat; Where I may live at last my own, Where I at last may die unknown. I spoke; she turn'd her magic ray; And thus she said, or seem'd to say; 9 Youth, you're mistaken, if you think to find In shades, a med'cine for a troubled mind: Wan grief will haunt you whereso'er you go, Sigh in the breeze, and in the streamlet flow. There pale inaction pines his life away; And satiate mourns the quick return of day: There, naked frenzy laughing wild with pain, Or bares the blade, or plunges in the main : There superstition broods o'er all her fears, And yells of demons in the zephyr hears. But if a hermit you're resolv'd to dwell, And bid to social life a last farewell; 'Tis impious. 10 God never made an independent man; 12 Nor study only, practice what you know; 13 Though man's ungrateful, or though fortune frown; Nor yet unrecompens'd are virtue's pains; Whom Heaven approves of most, must feel her rod, * One of the accusers of Socrates. GRAINGER. FINIS. Sect. PART I. PIECES IN PROSE. CHAPTER I. Select Sentences and Paragraphs, CHAPTER II,-Narrative Pieces. 1. No rank or possessions can make the guilty mind happy, 2. Change of external condition often adverse to virtue, 3. Haman; or the misery of pride, 4. Motives to the practice of gentleness, 5. A suspicious temper the source of misery to its possessor, 7. Diffidence of our abilities a mark of wisdom, 8. On the importance of order in the distribution of our time, 9. The dignity of virtue amidst corrupt examples, 10. The mortifications of vice greater than those of virtue, 12. Rank and riches afford no ground for envy, 13. Patience under provocations our interest as well as duty, 15. Omniscience and onnipresence of the Deity, source of consolation, 62 CHAPTER IV.-Argumentative Pieces. 1. Happiness is founded in rectitude of conduct, 2. Virtue man's highest interest, 3 The injustice of an uncharitable spirit, 4. The misfortunes of men mostly chargeable on themselves, 8. Prosperity is redoubled to a good man, 9. On the beauties of the Psalms. 10. Character of Alfred, king of England, $76 79 80- 81 62 83 84 85 86 87 8) 94 |