FRIENDSHIP: AN ODE.

PRINTED IN THE GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE, 1743.

1 FRIENDSHIP, peculiar boon of Heaven, The noble mind's delight and pride

To men and angels only given,

To all the lower world denied!

2 While love, unknown among the blest,
Parent of thousand wild desires,
The savage and the human breast
Torments alike with raging fires;

3 With bright, but oft destructive gleam,
Alike o'er all his lightnings fly;
Thy lambent glories only beam
Around the favourites of the sky.

4 Thy gentle flows of guiltless joys,
On fools and villains ne'er descend;
In vain for thee the tyrant sighs,
And hugs a flatterer for a friend.

5 Directress of the brave and just,

Oh, guide us through life's darksome way !
And let the tortures of mistrust
On selfish bosoms only prey.

6 Nor shall thine ardours cease to glow,

When souls to peaceful climes remove:

What raised our virtue here below,

Shall aid our happiness above.

IMITATION OF THE STYLE OF 1

1 HERMIT hoar, in solemn cell

Wearing out life's evening gray,
Strike thy bosom, sage, and tell
What is bliss, and which the way.

2 Thus I spoke, and speaking sigh'd, Scarce repress'd the starting tear, When the hoary sage replied,

'Come, my lad, and drink some beer.'

ONE AND TWENTY.

1 LONG-expected one-and twenty,
Lingering year, at length is flown:
Pride and pleasure, pomp and plenty,
Great * *

are now your own.

2 Loosen'd from the minor's tether,
Free to mortgage or to sell,
Wild as wind, and light as feather,
Bid the sons of thrift farewell.

3 Call the Betsies, Kates, and Jennies,
All the names that banish care ;
Lavish of your grandsire's guineas,
Show the spirit of an heir.

'Supposed to be Percy.

4 All that prey on vice and folly
Joy to see their quarry fly :
There the gamester, light and jolly;
There the lender, grave and sly.

5 Wealth, my lad, was made to wander, Let it wander as it will; Call the jockey, call the pander,

Bid them come and take their fill.

6 When the bonny blade carouses,
Pockets full, and spirits high-
What are acres? what are houses?
Only dirt, or wet, or dry.

7 Should the guardian friend or mother
Tell the woes of wilful waste :
Scorn their counsel, scorn their pother,
You can hang or drown at last.

THE POETICAL WORKS

OF

THOMAS PARNELL.