The promis'd verse no longer I'll delay
(She fhall be fatisfy'd another way).

With that he rais'd his tuneful voice aloud,
The knotty oaks their listening branches bow'd,
And savage beasts and Sylvan Gods did crowd;
For lo! he fung the world's ftupendous birth,
How scatter'd feeds of fea, and air, and earth,
And purer fire, through universal night
And empty space, did fruitfully unite;
From whence th' innumerable race of things,
By circular fucceffive order springs.

}

By what degrees this earth's compacted sphere Was harden'd, woods and rocks and towns to bear; How finking waters (the firm land to drain) Fill'd the capacious deep, and form'd the main, While from above, adorn'd with radiant light, A new-born fun furpriz'd the dazzled fight; How vapours turn'd to clouds obfcure the sky, And clouds diffolv'd the thirsty ground supply;

How the first foreft rais'd its fhady head,

Till when, few wandering beafts on unknown mountains fed.

Then Pyrrha's ftony race rose from the ground,
Old Saturn reign'd with golden plenty crown'd,
And bold Prometheus (whofe untam'd defire
Rival'd the fun with his own heavenly fire)
Now doom'd the Scythian vulture's endless prey,
Severely pays for animating clay.

He nam'd the nymph (for who but Gods could tell?)
Into whofe arms the lovely Hylas fell;

Alcides

Alcides wept in vain for Hylas loft,

Hylas in vain refounds through all the coaft.
He with compaffion told Pafiphaë's fault,
Ah! wretched queen! whence came that guilty thought?
The maids of Argos, who with frantic cries
And imitated lowings fill'd the skies,

(Though metamorphos'd in their wild conceit)
Did never burn with fuch unnatural heat.

Ah! wretched queen! while you on mountains stray,
He on foft flowers his fnowy fide does lay ;
Or feeks in herds a more proportion'd love :
Surround, my nymphs, fhe cries, furround the grove;
Perhaps fome footsteps printed in the clay,
Will to my love direct your wandering way;
Perhaps, while thus in fearch of him I roam,
My happier rivals have intic'd him home.
He fung how Atalanta was betray'd

By thofe Hefperian baits her lover laid,

And the fad fifters who to trees were turn'd,

While with the world th' ambitious brother burn'd.

All he defcrib'd was prefent to their

eyes,

And as he rais'd his verse, the poplars feem'd to rise.

He taught which Mufe did by Apollo's will
Guide wandering Gallus to th' Aonian hill:
(Which place the God for folemn meetings chofe)
With deep respect the learned fenate rose,
And Linus thus (deputed by the rest)

The hero's welcome, and their thanks, exprefs'd:
This harp of old to Hefiod did belong,

To this, the Mufes' gift, join thy harmonious fong;

Charm'd

Charm'd by these strings, trees starting from the ground,
Have follow'd with delight the powerful found.
Thus confecrated, thy Grynæan grove

Shall have no equal in Apollo's love.

Why fhould I speak of the Megarian maid,
For love perfidious, and by love betray'd?
And her, who round with barking monsters arm'd,
The wandering Greeks (ah frighted men !) alarm'd;
Whofe only hope on fhatter'd fhips depends,
While fierce fea-dogs devour the mangled friends.
Or tell the Thracian tyrant's alter'd shape,
And dire revenge of Philomela's rape,

Who to those woods directs her mournful course,
Where she had fuffer'd by incestuous force,
While, loth to leave the palace too well known,
Progné flies, hovering round, and thinks it still her own?
Whatever near Eurota's happy stream

With laurels crown'd, had been Apollo's theme,
Silenus fings; the neighbouring rocks reply,
And send his myftic numbers through the sky;
Till night began to fpread her gloomy veil,
And call'd the counted fheep from every dale;
The weaker light unwillingly declin'd,

And to prevailing fhades the murmuring world refign'd.

ODE

ODE UPON SOLITUDE.

I.

HAIL, facred Solitude! from this calm bay,

I view the world's tempeftuous sea,
And with wife pride despise

All thofe fenfeless vanities:

With pity mov'd for others, caft away

On rocks of hopes and fears, I fee them tofs'd
On rocks of folly, and of vice, I fee them loft:
Some the prevailing malice of the great,

Unhappy men or adverse Fate,

}

Sunk deep into the gulphs of an afflicted state.
But more, far more, a numberless prodigious train,
Whilft Virtue courts them, but alas in vain,

Fly from her kind embracing arms,

Deaf to her fondeft call, blind to her greatest charms, And, funk in pleasures and in brutish ease,

They in their shipwreck'd state themselves obdurate please. II.

Hail, facred Solitude! foul of my foul,

It is by thee I truly live,

Thou doft a better life and nobler vigour give;

Doft each unruly appetite control :

Thy conftant quiet fills my peaceful breast,

With unmix'd joy, uninterrupted rest.
Prefuming love does ne'er invade

This private folitary shade;

And, with fantastic wounds by beauty made,

. The

The joy has no allay of jealoufy, hope, and fear,
The folid comforts of this happy sphere:

Yet I exalted Love admire,

Friendship, abhorring fordid gain,

And purify'd from Luft's dishonest stain :
Nor is it for my folitude unfit,

For I am with my friend alone,

As if we were but one;

'Tis the polluted love that multiplies,
But friendship does two fouls in one comprise.

III.

Here in a full and conftant tide doth flow

All bleffings man can hope to know; Here in a deep recefs of thought we find

Pleafures which entertain, and which exalt the mind; Pleasures which do from friendship and from knowledge rife,

Which make us happy, as they make us wife :
Here may I always on this downy grafs,
Unknown, unfeen, my easy minutes pass :
Till with a gentle force victorious death
My folitude invade,

And, ftopping for a while my breath,
With ease convey me to a better fhade.

THE