In Fame's fair Temple, o'er the boldest wits Inshrined on high the sacred Virgil sits; And sits in measures, such as Virgil's Muse, To place thee near him, might be fond to choose. How might he tune the alternate reed with thee! Perhaps a Strephon thou, a Daphnis he;
While some old Damon, o'er the vulgar wise, 35
Thinks he deserves, and thou deservest the prize!
Rapt with the thought, my fancy seeks the plains,
And turns me shepherd while I hear the strains.
Indulgent nurse of every tender gale,
Parent of flowerets, old Arcadia, hail!
Here in the cool my limbs at ease I spread;
Here let thy poplars whisper o'er my head;
Still slide thy waters, soft among the trees;
Thy aspens quiver in a breathing breeze!
Smile, all ye valleys, in eternal spring!
Be hush'd, ye winds, while Pope and Virgil sing!
In English lays, and all sublimely great,
Thy Homer warms with all his ancient heat;
He shines in council, thunders in the fight,
And flames with every sense of great delight. 50
Long has that poet reign'd, and long unknown,
Like monarchs sparkling on a distant throne;
In all the majesty of Greek retired;
Himself unknown, his mighty name admired;
His language failing, wrapp'd him round with
Thine, raised by thee, recalls the work to light. So wealthy mines, that ages long before
Fed the large realms around with golden ore, When choked by sinking banks, no more appear, And shepherds only say, 'The mines were here :'
Should some rich youth (if nature warm his heart,
And all his projects stand inform'd with art) Here clear the caves, there ope the leading vein; The mines detected flame with gold again.
How vast, how copious are thy new designs! 65 How every music varies in thy lines!
Still, as I read, I feel my bosom beat,
And rise in raptures by another's heat.
Thus in the wood, when summer dress'd the days,
While Windsor lent us tuneful hours of ease,
Our ears the lark, the thrush, the turtle bless'd,
And Philomela sweetest o'er the rest.
The shades resound with song: O, softly tread,
While a whole season warbles round my head.
This to my friend: and when a friend inspires, My silent harp its master's hand requires; Shakes off the dust, and makes these rocks re
For fortune placed me in unfertile ground;
Far from the joys that with my soul agree,
From wit, from learning, very far from thee.
Here moss-grown trees expand the smallest leaf;
Here half an acre's corn is half a sheaf;
Here hills with naked heads the tempest meet,
Rocks at their sides, and torrents at their feet;
Or lazy lakes unconscious of a flood,
Whose dull brown Naiads ever sleep in mud.
Yet here content can dwell, and learned ease;
A friend delight me, and an author please;
Ev'n here I sing, when Pope supplies the theme;
Show my own love, though not increase his fame.
LET vulgar souls triumphal arches raise,
Or speaking marbles, to record their praise;
And picture (to the voice of fame unknown)
The mimic feature on the breathing stone;
Mere mortals; subject to death's total sway,
Reptiles of earth, and beings of a day!
'Tis thine on every heart to grave thy praise, A monument which worth alone can raise : Sure to survive, when time shall whelm in dust The arch, the marble, and the mimic bust: Nor till the volumes of the expanded sky Blaze in one flame, shalt thou and Homer die: Then sink together in the world's last fires, What Heaven created, and what Heaven inspires. If aught on earth, when once this breath is
fled,
With human transport touch the mighty dead,
Shakspeare, rejoice! his hand thy page refines;
Now every scene with native brightness shines:
Just to thy fame, he gives thy genuine thought;
So Tully publish'd what Lucretius wrote;
Pruned by his care, thy laurels loftier grow,
And bloom afresh on thy immortal brow.
Thus when thy draughts, O Raphael! time in-
vades,
And the bold figure from the canvass fades,
A rival hand recalls from every part
Some latent grace, and equals art with art:
Transported we survey the dubious strife,
While each fair image starts again to life.
How long untuned had Homer's sacred lyre
Jarr'd grating discord, all extinct his fire!
This you beheld; and, taught by Heaven to sing,
Call'd the loud music from the sounding string.
Now, waked from slumbers of three thousand
years,
Once more Achilles in dread pomp appears;
Towers o'er the field of death; as fierce he
Keen flash his arms, and all the hero burns: With martial stalk, and more than mortal might, He strides along, and meets the gods in fight: Then the pale Titans, chain'd on burning floors, Start at the din that rends the infernal shores; 40 Tremble the towers of heaven, earth rocks her
And gloomy Pluto shakes with all his ghosts.
To every theme responds thy various lay;
Here rolls a torrent, there meanders play ;
Sonorous as the storm thy numbers rise,
Toss the wild waves, and thunder in the skies;
Or, softer than a yielding virgin's sigh,
The gentle breezes breathe away and die.
Thus, like the radiant god who sheds the day,
You paint the vale, or gild the azure way ; 50
And while with every theme the verse complies,
Sink without groveling, without rashness rise.
Proceed, great bard! awake the harmonious
string;
Be ours all Homer! still Ulysses sing.
How long that hero, by unskilful hands
Stripp'd of his robes, a beggar trod our lands!
Such as he wander'd o'er his native coast,
Shrunk by the wand, and all the warrior lost :
O'er his smooth skin a bark of wrinkles spread;
Old age disgraced the honors of his head;
Nor longer in his heavy eye-ball shined
The glance divine, forth beaming from the mind.
But you, like Pallas, every limb infold
With royal robes, and bid him shine in gold:
Touch'd by your hand, his manly frame improves
With grace divine, and like a god he moves.
Ev'n I, the meanest of the Muses' train,
Inflamed by thee, attempt a nobler strain;
Adventurous waken the Mæonian lyre,
Tuned by your hand, and sing as you inspire: 70 So, arm'd by great Achilles for the fight, Patroclus conquer'd in Achilles' right:
Like theirs, our friendship and I boast my
To thine united-for thy friendship's fame.
This labor past, of heavenly subjects sing, 75 While hovering angels listen on the wing, To hear from earth such heart-felt raptures rise, As, when they sing, suspended hold the skies: Or, nobly rising in fair virtue's cause, From thy own life transcribe the unerring laws : Teach a bad world beneath her sway to bend ; To verse like thine fierce savages attend,
And men more fierce when Orpheus tunes the
Ev'n fiends relenting hear their rage away.
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