For the unfcented fictions of the loom;
Who, fatisfy'd with only pencil'd fcenes,
Prefer to the performance of a God
Th' inferior wonders of an artist's hand.
Lovely indeed the mimic works of art,
But Nature's works far lovelier. I admire-
None more admires the painter's magic skill,
Who fhews me that which I fhall never fee,
Conveys a diftant country into mine,
And throws Italian light on English walls:
But imitative strokes can do no more
Than please the eye, fweet Nature ev'ry fenfe.
The air falubrious of her lofty hills,
The chearing fragrance of her dewy vales,
And music of her woods-no works of man,
May rival these; these all befpeak a power
Peculiar, and exclusively her own.
Beneath the open fky fhe spreads the feaft;
'Tis free to all 'tis ev'ry day renew'd;
Who fcorns it, starves defervedly at home.
He does not fcorn it, who, imprifon'd long
In fome unwholefome dungeon, and a prey
To fallow fickness, which the vapors, dank
And clammy, of his dark abode have bred,
Escapes at last to liberty and light:
His cheek recovers foon its healthful hue,
relumines its extinguish'd fires;
He walks, he leaps, he runs-is wing'd with joy,
And riots in the sweets of ev'ry breeze.
He does not fcorn it, who has long endur'd
A fever's agonies, and fed on drugs.
Nor yet the mariner, his blood inflam'd
With acrid falts; his very heart athirst
To gaze at Nature in her green array,
Upon the fhip's tall fide he stands, poffefs'd
With vifions prompted by intense defire :
Fair fields appear below, fuch as he left
Far diftant, fuch as he would die to find
He feeks them headlong, and is feen no more.
The spleen is feldom felt where Flora reigns; The low'ring eye, the petulance, the frown,
And fullen fadness, that o'erfhade, distort,
And mar the face of beauty, when no cause.
For fuch immeafurable woe appears,
These Flora banishes, and gives the fair
Sweet fmiles, and bloom less transient than her own.
It is the constant revolution, stale
And tastelefs, of the fame repeated joys,
That palls and fatiates, and makes languid life
A pedler's pack, that bows the bearer down.
Health fuffers, and the spirits ebb; the heart
Recoils from its own choice-at the full feast
Is famifh'd-finds no mufic in the fong,
No smartness in the jeft, and wonders why.
Yet thousands ftill defire to journey on,
Though halt and weary of the path they tread.
The paralytic, who can hold her cards,
But cannot play them, borrows a friend's hand
To deal and fhuffle, to divide and fort
Her mingled fuits and fequences, and fits
Spectatress both and spectacle, a fad
And filent cypher, while her proxy plays.
Others are dragg'd into the crowded room
Between fupporters; and, once feated, fit
Through downright inability to rife,
Till the ftout bearers lift the corpfe again.
These speak a loud memento, Yet ev❜n these
Themselves love life, and cling to it, as he
That overhangs a torrent, to a twig.
They love it, and yet loath it; fear to die,
Yet fcorn the purposes for which they live.
Then wherefore not renounce them? No-the dread, The flavish dread of folitude, that breeds
Reflection and remorfe, the fear of shame,
And their invet'rate habits, all forbid.
Whom call we gay? That honor has been long The boast of mere pretenders to the name.
The innocent are gay-the lark is gay,
That dries his feathers, faturate with dew,
Beneath the rofy cloud, while yet the beams
Of day-fpring overshoot his humble neft.
The peasant too, a witness of his fong,
Himself a fongfter, is as gay as he.
But fave me from the gaiety of those
Whose head-aches nail them to a noon-day bed;
And fave me too from theirs whofe haggard eyes
Flash desperation, and betray their pangs
For property ftripp'd off by cruel chance;
From gaiety that fills the bones with pain,
The mouth with blafphemy, the heart with woe.
The earth was made fo various, that the mind
Of defultory man, ftudious of change,
And pleas'd with novelty, might be indulg'd.
Profpects, however lovely, may be seen
Till half their beauties fade; the weary fight,
Too well acquainted with their smiles, flides off
Faftidious, seeking less familiar fcenes.
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