102

CALUMNY - DETRACTION - ENVY - SLANDER, &c.

7. So a wild Tartar, when he spies

A man that's valiant, handsome, wise,
If he can kill him, thinks t' inherit
His wit, his beauty, and his spirit;
As if just so much he enjoy'd,
As in another is destroy'd.

BUTLER'S Hudibras.

8. Envy's a sharper spur than pay,
And, unprovok'd, 't will court the fray;
No author ever spar'd a brother;
Wits are gamecocks to one another.

9. Fools may our scorn, not envy, raise, For envy is a kind of praise.

10. Who praises Lesbia's eyes and features,
Must call her sisters awkward creatures;
For the kind flattery's sure to charm
When we some other nymph disarm.

GAY's Fables.

GAY's Fables.

GAY's Fables.

11. Canst thou discern another's mind?
What is 't you envy? Envy's blind.
Tell Envy, when she would annoy,
That thousands want what you enjoy.
12. Slander'd in vain, enjoy the spleen of foes;
Let these from envy hate-from interest those!
Guilt, like the first, your gratitude requires,
Since none can envy till he first admires;
And nature tells the last his crime is none,
Who to your interest but prefers his own.

GAY's Fables.

AARON HILL.

13. Envy will merit, as its shade, pursue;

But, like a shadow, proves the substance true.
POPE'S Essay on Criticism.

14. Base envy withers at another's joy,
And hates that excellence it cannot reach.

THOMSON'S Seasons.

15. With that malignant envy, which grows pale
And sickens, even if a friend prevail,
Which merit and success pursues with hate,
And damns the worth it cannot imitate.

CALUMNY - DETRACTION - ENVY-SLANDER, &c.

17. Yet even her tyranny had such a grace, The women pardon'd all, except her face.

18.

16. For every thing contains within itself

The seeds and sources of its own corruption;
The cankering rust corrodes the brightest steel;
The moth frets out your garment, and the worm
Eats its slow way into the solid oak:

But Envy, of all evil things the worst,
The same to-day, to-morrow, and for ever,
Saps and consumes the heart in which it works.
CUMBERLAND's Menander.

19.

103

CHURCHILL.

BYRON'S Don Juan.

Curse the tongue

Whence slanderous rumour, like the adder's drop,
Distils her venom, withering friendship's faith,
Turning love's favour.

The ignoble mind
Loves ever to assail with secret blow
The loftier, purer beings of their kind.

20. As a base pack of yelping hounds,
Who wish their betters to annoy,
If a stray cur enter their bounds,

Will bruise and mangle and destroy;
So they will on some plan unite,
By which to vex him and to spite:
His very virtues they will use
As pretexts for their foul abuse.

HILLHOUSE.

W. G. SIMMS.

J. T. WATSON.

104

CANDOUR-CARE, &c.

CANDOUR. (See ARTIFICE.)

3.

CARE-MELANCHOLY - GLOOM.

1. Why should a man, whose blood is warm within, Sit like his grandsire, cut in alabaster?

2. Care that is enter'd once into the breast, Will have the whole possession, ere it rest.

BEN JONSON.

That spoils the dance of youthful blood,
Strikes out the dimple from the cheek of mirth,
And ev'ry smirking feature from the face,
Branding our laughter with the name of madness.
BLAIR'S Grave.

4. The spleen with sudden vapour clouds the brain,
And binds the spirits in its heavy chain;
Howe'er the cause fantastic may appear,
Th' effect is real and the pain sincere.

5. But human bodies are sic fools,
For a' their colleges and schools,
That, when nae real ills perplex them,
They mak enow themsels to vex them.

SHAKSPEARE.

6. If thou wilt think of moments gone,
Of joys as exquisite as brief,
Know, mem'ry, when she lingers on
Past pleasure, turns it all to grief.

7. Go, you may call it madness-folly—
You shall not chase my gloom away;
There's such a charm in melancholy,
I would not, if I could, be gay!

BLACKMORE.

BURNS.

From the Spanish - BowRING.

ROGERS.

8.

Melancholy

Sits on me as a cloud along the sky,
Which will not let the sunbeams through, nor yet
Descend in rain, and end; but spreads itself
"Twixt heav'n and earth, like Envy between man
And man-and is an everlasting mist.

9. And if I laugh at any mortal thing,

'Tis that I may not weep; and if I weep, "T is that our nature cannot always bring

Itself to apathy, which we must steep
First in the icy depths of Lethe's spring,

Ere what we least wish to behold will sleep.

10. But can the noble mind for ever brood,
The willing victim of a weary mood,
On heartless cares that squander life away,
And cloud young Genius bright'ning into day?

BYRON'S Don Juan

11. T was thus in Nature's bloom and solitude,
He nurs'd his grief till nothing could assuage;
"T was thus his tender spirit was subdued,
Till in life's toils it could no more engage.

12. Come, rouse thee, dearest: 't is not well
To let the spirit brood

Thus darkly o'er the cares that swell
Life's current to a flood.

As brooks and torrents, rivers, all
Increase the gulf in which they fall,
Such thoughts, by gathering up the rills
Of lesser griefs, spread real ills;
And with their gloomy shades conceal
The landmarks Hope would else reveal.

BYRON.

CAMPBELL.

CARLOS WILCOX.

MRS. DINNIES.

106

CARE - MELANCHOLY - GLOOM.

13. Blame not, if oft, in melancholy mood,

This theme too far such fancy hath pursued;
And if the soul, which high with hope should beat,
Turns to the gloomy grave's unblest retreat.

14. Oh! it is hard to put the heart Alone and desolate away

To curl the lip in pride, and part
With the kind thoughts of yesterday.

ROBERT SANDS.

15. Strange that the love-lorn heart will beat With rapture wide amid its folly ;—

No grief so soft, no pain so sweet

As love's delicious melancholy.

N. P. WILLIS.

MRS. A. B. WELBY. 16. O! dark is the gloom o'er my young spirit stealing! Then why should I linger when others are gay?— The smile that I wear, is but worn for concealing A heart, that is wasting in sadness away.

MRS. A. B. WELBY.

18. How vain a task, to wake my lyre
To rapture's thrill, with passion's fire,
While sorrow o'er my heart-strings plays,
With trembling touch, her saddest lays !

17. Alas, for my weary and care-haunted bosom!
The spells of the spring-time arouse it no more;
The song in the wildwood, the sheen in the blossom,

The fresh-swelling fountain-their magic is o'er!
When I list to the stream, when I look on the flowers,
They tell of the Past, with so mournful a tone,
That I call up the throngs of my long-vanish'd hours,
And sigh that their transports are over and gone.
WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK.

MRS. OSGOOD.

19. Pale Care now sits enthron'd upon that cheek, Where rosy Health did erst her empire hold.

J. T. WATSON.