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ADVERTISEMENT.

a

HE hint of the following piece was taken from Chaucer's House of Fame. The design is in manner entirely alter'd, the descriptions and most of the particular thoughts my own: Yet I could not fuffer it to be printed without this acknowledgment. The reader who would compare this with Chaucer, may begin with his third book of Fame, there being nothing in the two first books that answers to their title: Wherever any hint is taken from him, the passage itself is set down in the marginal notes.

THE

TEMPLE

OF

FAM

I

Ε.

N that foft season when defcending show'rs Call forth the greens, and wake the rising flow'rs; When opening buds falute the welcome day, And earth relenting feels the genial ray;

VER. 1. In that soft season, &c.] This Poem is introduced in the manner of the Provencial Poets, whose works were for the most part Vifions, or pieces of imagination, and conftantly descriptive. From these, Petrarch and Chaucer frequently borrow the idea of their poems. See the Trionfi of the former, and the Dream, Flower and the Leaf, &c. of the latter. The Author of this therefore chose the fame fort of Exor

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As balmy sleep had charm'd my cares to reft,
And love itself was banish'd from my breast,
(What time the morn mysterious visions brings,
While purer slumbers spread their golden wings)
A train of phantoms in wild order rose,
And, join'd, this intellectual scene compose.

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10

15

I ftood, methought, betwixt earth, seas, and skies; The whole creation open to my eyes: In air self-ballanc'd hung the globe below, Where mountains rise, and circling oceans flow; Here naked rocks, and empty wastes were seen, There tow'ry cities, and the forefts green : Here failing ships delight the wand'ring eyes: There trees, and intermingl'd temples rise; Now a clear fun the shining scene displays, The tranfient landscape now in clouds decays.

O'er the wide prospect as I gaz'd around, Sudden I heard a wild promiscuous found, Like broken thunders that at distance roar, Or billows murm'ring on the hollow shore :

20

VER. 11, &c.] 'These verses are hinted from the following of Chaucer, Book 2.

Tho beheld I fields and plains,
Now hills, and now mountains,
Now valeis, and now foreftes,
And now unneth great beftes,
Now rivers, now citees,

Now towns, now great trees,
Now shippes fayling in the fee.

Then

Then gazing up, a glorious pile beheld,
Whose tow'ring summit ambient clouds conceal'd.
High on a rock of Ice the structure lay,
Steep its afcent, and slipp'ry was the way;
The wond'rous rock like Parian marble shone,
And feem'd, to distant fight, of solid stone.
Inscriptions here of various Names I view'd,
The greater part by hoftile time subdu'd;

25

30

Yet

VER. 27. High on a rock of ice, &c.] Chaucer's third book of Fame.

It ftood upon so high a rock,
Higher standeth none in Spayne
What manner stone this rock was,
For it was like a lymed glass,
But that it shone full more clere;
But of what congeled matere
It was, I niste redily;
But at the last espied I,
And found that it was every dele,
A rock of ise, and not of ftele.

VER. 31. Inscriptions here, &c.]
The faw I all the hill y-grave
With famous folkes names fele,
That had been in much wele
And her fames wide y-blow;
But well unneth might I know,
Any letters for to rede

Ther names by, for out of drede

B 3

They