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For juft experience tells in every foil,

That those who think must govern those that toil,
And all that freedom's highest aims can reach,
Is but to lay proportion'd loads on each;
Hence, should one order difproportion'd grow,
Its double weight muft ruin all below.

O then, how blind to all that truth requires,
Who think it freedom when a part aspires!
Calm is my foul, nor apt to rise in arms,
Except when fast approaching danger warms;
But when contending chiefs blockade the throne,
Contracting regal power to stretch their own;
When I behold a factious band agree

To call it freedom when themselves are free;
Each wanton judge new penal statutes draw,
Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule the law;
The wealth of climes, where favage nations roam,
Pillag'd from flaves to purchase slaves at home-
Fear, pity, juftice, indignation start,

Tear off referve, and bare my fwelling heart;
'Till half a patriot, half a coward grown,
I fly from petty tyrants to the throne.

Yes, brother, curfe with me that baleful hour,
When first ambition struck at regal power;
And, thus polluting honour in its fource,

Gave wealth to fway the mind with double force.
Have we not feen, round Britain's peopled shore,
Her useful fons exchang'd for useless ore!

Seen all her triumphs but deftruction hafte,
Like flaring tapers bright'ning as they wafte;
Seen opulence, her grandeur to maintain,
Lead ftern depopulation in her train,

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And, over fields where scatter'd hamlets rose,
In barren folitary pomp repose!

Have we not seen, at pleasure's lordly call,
The fmiling long-frequented village fall!
Beheld the duteous fon, the fire decay'd,
The modeft matron, and the blushing maid,
Forc'd from their homes-a melancholy train—
To traverse climes beyond the western main,
Where wild Ofwego spreads her swamps around,
And Niagara ftuns with thund'ring found!

Ev'n now, perhaps, as there fome pilgrim strays
Thro' tangled forests, and thro' dang'rous ways,
Where beasts with man divided empire claim,
And the brown Indian marks with murd'rous aim;
There, while above the giddy tempest flies,
And all around distressful yells arise,

The penfive exile, bending with his woe,
To ftop too fearful, and too faint to go,
Casts a fond look where England's glories shine,
And bids his bosom sympathize with mine!
Vain, very vain, my weary search to find
That bliss which only centers in the mind:
Why have I stray'd from pleasure and repose,
To feek a good each government bestows?
In every government, though terrors reign,
Though tyrant kings, or tyrant laws reftrain,
How fmall of all that human hearts endure,
That part which laws or kings can cause or cure!
Still to ourselves, in every place confign'd,

Our own felicity we make or find;

With fecret course, which no loud storms annoy, Glides the finooth current of domestic joy:

The lifted axe, the agonizing wheel,

Luke's iron crown, and Damien's bed of steel,
To men remote from pow'r but rarely known,
Leave reason, faith, and conscience, all our own.

"As in those domes, where Cæfars once bore fway, "Defac'd by time and tottering in decay, "There in the ruin, heedless of the dead, "The shelter-seeking peasant builds his shed, "And, wondering man could want the larger pile, "Exults, and owns his cottage with a fmile." TRAVELLER, P. 26.

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THE

DESERTED VILLAGE.

A POEM.

FIRST PRINTED IN MDCCLXIX.

"How often have I paus'd on every charm-
"The fhelter'd cot, the cultivated farm,
"The never-failing brook, the bufy mill,

"The decent church that topt the neighbouring hill."

DES. VIL. P. 41.

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