Prophetic of the dire impending blow,
The prefage of her lofs, and Britain's woe.
Already portion'd, unrelenting Fate
Had made a pause upon the number'd date;
Behind, stood Death, too horrible for fight,
In darkness clad, expectant, prun'd for flight;
Pleas'd at the word, the fhapeless monfter fped,
On eager meffage to the humble fhed,
Where wrapt by foft poetic vifions round,
Sweet flumbering, Fancy's darling fon he found.
At his approach the filken pinion'd train
Affrighted, mount aloft, and quit the brain;
Which late they fann'd: now other fcenes than dales
Of woody pride, fucceed, or flow'ry vales:
As when a fudden tempeft veils the sky,
Before ferene, and ftreamy lightnings fly;
The profpect shifts, and pitchy volumes roll,
Along the drear expanfe, from pole to pole;
Terrific horrors all the void invest,
Whilft the Archspectre issues forth confest.
The Bard beholds him beckon to the tomb
Of yawning night, eternity's dread womb;
In vain attempts to fly, th' impaffive air
Retards his steps, and yields him to defpair;
He feels a gripe that thrills thro' ev'ry vein,
And panting fruggles in the fatal chain.
Here paus'd the fell Deftroyer to furvey
The pride, the boaft of man, his deftin'd prey :
Prepar'd to strike, he pois'd aloft the dart,
And plung'd the fteel in Virtue's bleeding heart;
Abhorrent, back the fprings of life rebound,
And leave on nature's face a grisly wound,
A wound enroll'd among Britannia's woes,
That ages yet to follow, cannot close.
Oh Goldfmith! how fhall forrow now effay
To murmur out her flow incondite lay?
In what fad accents mourn the luckless hour,
That yielded thee to unrelenting power;
Thee, the proud boaft, of all the tuneful train
That fweep the lyre, or fwell the polish'd strain ?
Much honour'd Bard! if my untutor❜d verfe
Could pay a tribute, worthy of thy hearse,
With fearless hands I'd build the fane of praise,
And boldly ftrew the never-fading bays.
But, ah! with thee my guardian Genius fled,
And pillow'd in thy tomb his filent head :
Pain'd Memory alone behind remains,
And penfive talks the folitary plains,
Rich in her forrows, honours without art,
She pays in tears, redundant from the heart.
And fay, what boots it o'er thy hallow'd duft
To heap the graven pile, or laurel'd bust;
Since by thy hands already rais'd on high,
We fee a fabrick tow'ring to the fky;
Where hand and hand with time, the facred lore
Shall travel on, till nature is no more?
Extract from the FEMALE ADVOCATE; a Poem. By Mifs Scorr.
SAY, MONTAGU, can this unartful verse
Thy Genius, Learning, or thy Worth rehearse?
To paint thy talents justly should conspire
Thy tafte, thy judgment, and thy SHAKESPEARE's fire.
Well hath thy Pen with nice difcernment trac'd
What various pow'rs the Matchlefs Poet grac'd;
Well hath thy Pen his various beauties shown,
And prov'd thy foul congenial to his own.
Charm'd with thofe fplendid honours of thy Name,
Fain would the Mufe relate thy nobler Fame;
Dear to Religion, as to Learning dear,
Candid, obliging, modeft, mild, fincere ;
Still prone to foften at another's woe,
Still fond to bless, ftill ready to beflow.
O, fweet Philanthropy ! thou gueft divine!
What permanent, what heart-felt joys are thine!
Supremely bleft the maid, whofe generous foul
Bends all-obedient to thy foft controul:
Nature's vaft theatre her eye furveys,
Studious to trace Eternal Wisdom's ways;
Marks what dependencies, what different ties,
Throughout the fpacious feale of beings rife ;
Sees Providence's oft-myfterious plan,
Form'd to promote the general good of man.
With noble warmth thence her expanded mind
Feels for the welfare of all human kind:
Thence flows each lenient art that fooths distress,
And thence the unremitting wish to blefs!
Th' afpiring Mufe now droops her trembling wings,
Whilft, INDOLENCE, † thy tranquil pow'r the fings';
"Nor fordid floth," the low-born mind's disease,
But calm retirement, and poetic ease.
*Mrs. Montagu, author of the "Effay on the Genius and Writings of Shakespeare, compared with the Greek and French Dramatic Poets."
+ See Indolence, a Poem, by the author of Almida, a Tragedy. (Mrs. Celefia, daughter of the late Mr. Mallett.)
Ah! let me ever live with THEE immur'd,
From Folly's laugh, from Envy's rage fecur'd,
In ev'ry scene of changeful life the fame,
Not fondly courting, nor defpifing Fame.
TALBOT, did e'er mortality enshrine
A mind more gen'rous, meek, or kind, than thine
Delightful moralift; thy well-wrote page
Shall please, correct, and mend the rifing age;
Point out the road the thoughtless many mifs,
That leads through virtue to the realms of bliss.
Fain would my foul thy fentiments imbibe,
And fain thy manners in my own transcribe:
Genius and Wit were but thy fecond praise,
Thou knew'ft to win by ftill fublimer ways;
Thy Angel-good nefs, all who knew approv'd,
Honour'd, admir'd, applauded too, and lov'd!
Fair fhall thy fame to latest ages bloom,
And ev'ry Mufe with tears bedew thy tomb.
Extracts from the COUNTRY JUSTICE, a Poem; by one of his Majesty's JUSTICES of the PEACE for the County of SOMERSET.
The Appointment, and its Purposes.
HE focial Laws from infult to protect,
To cherish peace, to cultivate respect;
The rich from wanton cruelty reftrain,
To smooth the bed of penury and pain:
The hapless vagrant to his reft restore,
The maze of fraud, the haunts of theft explore;
The thoughtless maiden, when fubdu'd by art,
To aid, and bring her rover to her heart;
Wild riot's voice with dignity to quell,
Forbid unpeaceful paffions to rebel,
Wreft from revenge the meditated harm,
For this fair JUSTICE raised her facred arm;
For this the rural Magiftrate, of yore,
Thy honours, Edward, to his manfion bore.
Mrs. Catherine Talbot, only daughter of the Reverend Edward Talbot, Archdeacon of Berks, and Preacher at the Rolls; (younger fon of Dr. Talbot, Bishop of Durham). This truly excellent Lady was bleft with the happiest natural talents; her understanding was vigorous, her imagination lively, and her taste refined. Her virtues were equal to her genius, and rendered her at once the object of universal love and admiration. She was the author of "Re"flections on the Seven Days of the Week;" and of " Effays on various Sub"jects," z volumes. Her writings breathe the noblet fpirit of Christian benevolence; and discover a more than common acquaintance with human
Oft, where old AIR in confcious glory fails,
On filver waves that flow thro' fmiling vales,
In Harewood's groves, where long my youth was laid,
Unfeen beneath their antient world of shade,
With many a group of antique columns crown'd
In Gothic guife fuch manfion have I found.
Nor lightly deem, ye apes of modern race,
Ye cits, that fore bedizen nature's face,
Of the more manly ftructures here ye view;
They role for greatness that ye never knew!
Ye reptile cits, that oft have mov'd my spleen
With VENUS and the GRACES on your green!
Let PLUTUS, growling o'er his ill-got wealth,
Let MERCURY, the thriving God of stealth,
The shopman, JANUS, with his double looks,
Rife on your mounts, and perch upon your
books!
But, fpare my Venus, fpare each fifter grace,
Ye cits, that fore bedizen nature's face!
Ye royal architects, whofe antic tafte,
Would lay the realms of fense and nature waste,
Forgot, whenever from her steps ye ftray,
That folly only points each other way;
Here, tho' your eye no courtly creature fees,
Snakes on the ground, or Monkies in the trees;
Yet let not too fevere a cenfure fall,
On the plain precincts of the antient hall.
For tho' no fight your childish fancy meets,
Of Thibet's dogs, or China's perroquets;
Tho' apes, afps, lizards, things without a tail,
And all the tribes of foreign monfters fail;
Here fhall ye figh to fee, with ruft o'ergrown,
The iron griffin, and the fphynx of stone;
And mourn, neglected in their waste abodes,
Fire-breathing drakes, and water-fpouting gods.
Long have these mighty monfters known difgrace,
Yet ftill fome trophies hold their ancient place;
Where, round the hall, the oak's high furbase rears
The field-day triumphs of two hundred years.
Th' enormous antlers here recal the day
That faw the Foreft-Monarch forc'd away;
Who, many a flood, and many a mountain past,
Nor finding thofe, nor deeming thefe the laft,
O'er floods, o'er mountains yet prepar'd to fly,
Long ere the death-drop fill'd his failing eye!
Here, fam'd for cunning, and in crimes grown old,
Hangs his grey brush, the felon of the fold.
Oft, as the rent feaft fwells the midnight cheer,
The maudlin farmer kens him o'er his beer,
And tells his old, traditionary tale,
Tho' known to ev'ry tenant of the vale.
Here, where, of old, the feftal ox has fed,
Mark'd with his weight the mighty horns are spread:
Some ox, O MARSHALL, for a board like thine,
Where the vaft mafter with the vaft furloin
Vied in round magnitude-Respect I bear
To thee, tho' oft the ruin of the chair.
Thefe, and fuch antique tokens, that record
The manly fpirit, and the bounteous board,
Me more delight than all the gew-gaw train,
The whims and zigzags of a modern brain,
More than all Afia's marmosets to view
Grin, frisk, and water in the walks at Kew.
Character of a Country Justice.
Thro' thefe fair vallies, ftranger, haft thou ftray'd,
By any chance, to vifit HAREWOOD's fhade,
And feen with honeft, antiquated air,
In the plain hall the magistratial chair?
There HERBERT fate-The love of human kind,
Pure light of truth, and temperance of mind;
In the free eye the featur'd foul display'd,
HONOUR'S ftrong beam, and MERCY's melting fhade ;
JUSTICE, that, in the rigid paths of law,
Would still fome drops from PITY's fountain draw,
Bend o'er her urn with many a gen'rous fear,
Ere his firm feal fhould force one orphan's tear :
Fair EQUITY, and REASON fcorning art,
And all the fober virtues of the heart;
Thefe fate with HERBERT, these shall beft avail,
Where Statutes order; or where Statutes fail.
General Motives for Lenity.
Be this, ye rural magiftrates, your plan:
Firm be your Juftice, but be friends to man.
He whom the mighty mafter of this ball,
We fondly deem, or farcically call,
To own the patriarch's truth however loth,
Holds but a manfion crush'd before the Moth.
Frail in his genius, in his heart, too, frail,
Born but to err, and erring to bewail,
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