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"T is continence of mind, unknown before,
To write so well, and yet to write no more.
More bright renown can human nature claim,
Than to deserve, and fly immortal fame?

Next to the godlike praise of writing well,
Is on that praise with just delight to dwell.
O, for some God my drooping soul to raise !
That I might imitate, as well as praise;
For all commend: e'en foes your fame confess;
Nor would Augustus' age have priz'd it less;
An age, which had not held its pride so long,
But for the want of so complete a song.

A golden period shall from you commence :
Peace shall be sign'd 'twixt wit and manly sense;
Whether your genius or your rank they view,
The Muses find their Halifax in you.
Like him succeed! nor think my zeal is shown
For you; 'tis Britain's interest, not your own;
For lofty stations are but golden snares,
Which tempt the great to fall in love with cares.

I would proceed, but age has chill'd my vein, 'Twas a short fever, and I'm cool again. Though life I hate, methinks I could renew Its tasteless, painful course, to sing of you. When such the subject, who shall curb his flight? When such your genius, who shall dare to write? In pure respect, I give my rhyming o'er, And, to commend you most, commend no more.

Adieu, whoe'er thou art! on death's pale coast Ere long I'll talk thee o'er with Dryden's ghost; The bard will smile. A last, a long farewell! Henceforth I hide me in my dusky cell; There wait the friendly stroke that sets me free, And think of immortality and thee

My strains are number'd by the tuneful Nine; Each maid presents her thanks, and all present thee mine.

VERSES SENT BY LORD MELCOMBE
TO DOCTOR YOUNG,

NOT LONG BEFORE HIS LORDSHIP'S DEATH 1.

KIND companion of my youth,
Lov'd for genius, worth, and truth!
Take what friendship can impart,
Tribute of a feeling heart;

Take the Muse's latest spark2,
Ere we drop into the dark.
He, who parts and virtue gave,
Bad thee look beyond the grave: ·
Genius soars, and virtue guides;
Above, the love of God presides.
There's a gulf 'twixt us and God;
Let the gloomy path be trod :
Why stand shivering on the shore?
Why not boldly venture o'er?
Where unerring virtue guides,
Let us have the winds and tides:
Safe, through seas of doubts and fears,
Rides the bark which Virtue steers.

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SEA-PIECE:

CONTAINING

I. THE BRITISH SAILOR'S EXULTATION. II. HIS PRAYER BEFORE ENGAGEMENT.

THE DEDICATION.

TO MR. VOLTAIRE.

My Muse, a bird of passage, flies
From frozen clime to milder skies;
From chilling blasts she seeks thy cheering beam,
A beam of favour, here denied ;
Conscious of faults, her blushing pride
Hopes an asylum in so great a name.

To dive full deep in ancient days',
The warriors' ardent deeds to raise,
And monarch's aggrandize;-the glory, thine;
Thine is the drama, how renown'd!
Thine, epic's loftier trump to sound ;-
But let Arion's sea-strung harp be mine:

But where's his dolphin? Know'st thou, where?
May that be found in thee, Voltaire !
Save thou from harm my plunge into the wave:
How will thy name illustrious raise

So

My sinking song! Mere mortal lays, patronis'd, are rescued from the grave.

"Tell me," say'st thou, "who courts my smile? What stranger stray'd from yonder isle !—" No stranger, sir! though born in foreign climes; On Dorset downs, when Milton's page, With Sin and Death, provok'd thy rage, Thy rage provok'd, who sooth'd with gentle rhymes?

Who kindly couch'd thy censure's eye,
And gave thee clearly to descry

Sound judgment giving law to fancy strong?
Who half inclin'd thee to confess,

Nor could thy modesty do less,
That Milton's blindness lay not in his song?
But such debates long since are flown;
For ever set the suns that shone
On airy pastimes, cre our brows were grey :
How shortly shall we both forget,
To thee, my patron, I my debt,
And thou to thine for Prussia's golden key!

The present, in oblivion cast,

Full soon shall sleep, as sleeps the past; Full soon the wide distinction die between

The frowns and favours of the great;
High flush'd success, and pale defeat;
The Gallic gaiety, and British spleen,

Ye wing'd, ye rapid moments! stay!-
Oh friend! as deaf as rapid, they;
Life's little drama done, the curtain falls
Dost thou not hear it? I can hear,
Though nothing strikes the listening ear;
Time groans his last! Eternal loudly calls!
Nor calls in vain; the call inspires
Far other counsels and desires,

Than once prevail'd; we stand on higher ground;
What scenes we see !-Exalted aim!
With ardours new, our spirits flame;
Ambition blest! with more than laurels crown'd.

'Annals of the emperor Charles XII. Lewis XIV.

ODE THE FIRST.

THE BRITISH SAILOR'S EXULTATION.
In lofty sounds let those delight

Who brave the fe, but fear the fight;
And, bold in word, of arms decline the stroke:
'Tis mean to boast; but great to lend
To foes the counsel of a friend,
And warn them of the vengeance they provoke.

From whence arise these loud alarms?
Why gleams the south with brandish'd arms?
War, bath'd in blood, from curst ambition springs :
Ambition! mean, ignoble pride!
Perhaps their ardours may subside,
When weigh'd the wonders Britain's sailur sings.

Hear, and revere.-At Britain's nod,
From each enchanted grove and wood
Hastes the huge oak, or shadeless forest leaves;

The mountain pines assume new forms,
Spread canvass-wings, and fly through storms,
And ride o'er rocks, and dance on foaming waves.

She nods again: the labouring Earth
Discloses a tremendous birth`;

In smoking rivers runs her molten ore;

Thence monsters of enormous size,
And hideous aspect, threatening rise,

[powers!

Flame from the deck, from trembling bastions roar.
These ministers of fate fulfil,
On empires wide, an island's will,
When thrones unjust wake vengeance; know, ye
In sudden night, and ponderous balls,
And floods of flame, the tempest falls,
When brav'd Britannia's awful senate lowers.
In her grand council she surveys,
In patriot picture, what may raise,
Of insolent attempts, a warm disdain;

From hope's triumphant summit thrown,
Like darted lightning, swiftly down
The wealth of Ind, and confidence of Spain,
Britannia sheaths her courage keen,
And spares her nitrous magazine;
Her cannon slumber, till the proud aspire,

And leave all law below them; then they blaze!
They thunder from resounding seas,
Touch'd by their injur'd master's soul of fire.

Then furies rise! the battle raves!

And rends the skies! and warms the waves!
And calls a tempest from the peaceful deep,
In spite of Nature, spite of Jove,
While all serene, and hush'd above,
Tumultuous winds in azure chambers sleep.

A thousand deaths the bursting bomb
Hurls from her disembowel'd womb;
Chain'd, glowing globes, in dread alliance join'd,
Red-wing'd by strong, sulphureous blasts,
Sweep, in black whirlwinds, men and masts;
And leave singed, naked, blood-drown'd, decks be-
hind.

Dwarf laurels rise in tented fields;
The wreath immortal ocean yields;

There war's whole sting is shot, whole fire is spent,
Whole glory blooms: how pale, how tame,
How lambent is Bellona's flame!
How her storms languish on the continent!

House of lords.

From the dread front of ancient war
Less terrour frown'd; her scythed car,
Her castled elephant, and battering beam,
Stoop to those engines which deny

Superior terrours to the sky,

And boast their clouds, their thunder, and their
flame.

The flame, the thunder, and the cloud,
The night by day, the sea of blood,

Hosts whirl'd in air, the yell of sinking throngs
The graveless dead, an ocean warm'd,
A firmament by mortals storm'd,
To patient Britain's angry brows belongs.
Or do I dream? Or do I rave?
Or see I Vulcan's sooty cave,

Where Jove's red bolts the giant brothers frame?
Those swarthy gods of toil and heat
Loud peals on mountain anvils heat,

And panting tempests rouse the roaring flame.

Ye sons of Etna! hear my call;
Unfinish'd let those baubles fall,

Yon shield of Mars, Minerva's helmet blue :

Your strokes suspend, ye brawny throng!
Charm'd by the magic of my song,
Drop the feign'd thunder, and attempt the true.

Begin and first take rapid flight 3,
Fierce flume, and clouds of thickest night,
And ghostly terrour, paler than the dead;

Then borrow from the north his roar,

Mix groans and deaths; one phial pour
Of wrong'd Britannia's wrath; and it is made;
Gaul starts and trembles at your dreadful trade.

ODE THE SECOND:

IN WHICH IS THE

SAILOR'S PRAYER BEFORE ENGAGEMENT.
So form'd the bolt, ordain'd to break
Gaul's haughty plan, and Bourbon shake;
If Britain's crimes support not Britain's foes,
And edge their swords: O power divine!
If blest by thee the bold design,
Embattled hosts a single arm o'erthrows.

Ye warlike dead, who fell of old
In Britain's cause, by fame enroll'd
In deathless annal! deathless deeds inspire;
From oozy beds, for Britain's sake,
Awake, illustrious chiefs! awake;
And kindle in your sons paternal fire.

The day commission'd from above,
Our worth to weigh, our hearts to prove
If war's full shock too feeble to sustain ;
Or firm to stand its final blow,
When vital streams of blood shall flow,
And turn to crimson the discolour'd main;

That day's arriv'd, that fatal hour!—
"Hear us, O hear, Almighty Power!
Our guide in counsel, and our strength in fight!
Now war's important die is thrown,
If left the day to man alone,
How blind is wisdom, and how weak is might!

3 Alluding to Virgil's description of thunder.

"Let prostrate hearts, and awful fear, And deep remorse, and sighs sincere For Britain's guilt, the wrath divine appease; A wrath, more formidable far Than angry Nature's wasteful war, The whirl of tempests, and the roar of seas.

"From out the deep, to thee we cry, To thee, at Nature's helm on high! Steer thou our conduct, dread Omnipotence! To thee for succour we resort;

Thy favour is our only port;

Our only rock of safety, thy defence.

"O thou, to whom the lions roar,

And, not unheard, thy boon implore!

Thy throne our bursts of cannon loud invoke:

Thou canst arrest the flying ball;

Or send it back and bid it fall

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A Pindaric carries a formidable sound; but there

On those, from whose proud deck the thunder broke. is nothing formidable in the true nature of it; of

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Ally Supreme! we turn to thee;
We learn obedience from the sea;

With seas, and winds, henceforth, thy laws fulfil:
'Tis thine our blood to freeze, or warm;
To rouse, or hush, the martial storm;
And turn the tide of conquest, at thy will.

"Tis thine to beam sublime renown,
Or quench the glories of a crown ;

which (with utmost submission) I conceive the critics have hitherto entertained a false idea.

Pindar

is as natural as Anacreon, though not so familiar. As a fixt star is as much in the bounds of Nature, as a flower of the field, though less obvious, and of greater dignity. This is not the received notion of Pindar; I shall therefore soon support at large that hint which is now given.

Trade is a very noble subject in itself; more proper than any for an Englishman; and particularly seasonable at this juncture.

We have more specimens of good writing in every province, than in the sublime; our two famous epic poems excepted. I was willing to make an attempt where I had fewest rivals.

If, on reading this ode, any man has a fuller idea

'Tis thine to doom, 't is thine, from death to free; of the real interest, or possible glory of his country, To turn aside his level'd dart,

Or pluck it from the bleeding heart:

There we cast anchor, we confide in thee.

"Thou, who hast taught the north to roar, And streaming lights nocturnal pour 2, Of frightful aspect! when proud foes invade, Their blasted pride with dread to seize, Bid Britain's flags, as meteors, blaze; And George depute to thunder in thy stead.

"The right alone is bold and strong; Black, hovering clouds appal the wrong With dread of vengeance: Nature's awful sire! Less than one moment shouldst thou frown, Where is puissance and renown? Thrones tremble, empires sink, or worlds expire,

"Let George the just chastise the vain : Thou, who durst curb the rebel main, To mount the shore when boiling billows rave! Bid George repel a bolder tide, The boundless swell of Gallic pride; And check ambition's overwhelming wave.

"And when (all milder means withstood) Ambition, tam'd by loss of blood, Regains her reason; then, on angel's wings,

Let Peace descend, and shouting greet, With peals of joy, Britannia's fleet, How richly freighted! It, triumphant, brings The poise of kingdoms, and the fate of kings."

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than before; or a stronger impression from it, or a warmer concern for it, I give up to the critic any further reputation.

We have many copies and translations that pass for originals. This ode I humbly conceive is an original, though it professes imitation. No man can be like Pindar, by imitating any of his particular works; any more than like Raphael, by copying the cartoons. The genius and spirit of such great men must be collected from the whole; and when thus we are possessed of it, we must exert its energy in subjects and designs of our own. Nothing is so unpindarical as following Pindar on the foot. Pindar is an original, and he must be so too, who would be like Pindar in that which is his greatest praise. Nothing so unlike as a close copy, and a noble original.

As for length, Pindar has an unbroken ode of six hundred lines. Nothing is long or short in writing, but relatively to the demand of the subject, and the manner of treating it, A distich may be long, and a folio short. However, I have broken this ode into Strains, each of which may be considered as a separate ode if you please. And if the variety and fullness of matter be considered, I am rather apprehensive of danger from brevity in this ode, than from length. But lank writing is what I think ought most to be declined, if for nothing else, for our plenty of it.

The ode is the most spirited kind of poetry, and the Pindaric is the most spirited kind of ode; this I speak at my own very great peril: but truth has an eternal title to our confession, though we are sure to suffer by it.

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THE PRELude.

The proposition. An address to the vessel that brought over the king. Who should sing on this occasion. A Pindaric boast.

FAST by the surge my limbs are spread,
The naval oak nods o'er my head;
The winds are loud; the waves tumultuous roll;
Ye winds! indulge your rage no more;
Ye sounding billows! cease to roar;
The god descends; and transports warm my soul.
The waves are hush'd; the winds are spent!-
This kingdom, from the kingdoms rent,

I celebrate in song-Fam'd Isle ! no less,
By Nature's favour, from mankind,
Than by the foaming sea, disjoin'd;
Alone in bliss! an isle, in happiness!

Though fate and time have damp'd my strains,
Though youth no longer fires my veins,
Though slow their streams in this cold climate run;
The royal eye dispels my cares,
Recals the warmth of blooming years,
Returning George supplies the distant Sun.

Away, my soul! salute the Pine',
That glads the heart of Caroline,
Its grand deposit faithful to restore;

Salute the bark that ne'er shall hold
So rich a freight in gems or gold,
And loaded from both Indies would be poor.

My soul! to thee, she spreads her sails;
Their bosoms fill with sacred gales;
With inspiration from the godhead warm;
Now bound for an eternal clime

O send her down the tide of time, Snatch'd from oblivion, and secure from storm.

Or teach this flag, like that to soar,
Which gods of old and heroes bore;
Bid her a British constellation rise-

The sea she scorns; and, now, shall bound
On lofty billows of sweet sound,

I am her pilot, and her port the skies!

Dare you to sing, ye tinkling train?
Silence, ye wretched! ye profane!
Who shackle prose, and boast of absent gods;
Who murder thought, and numbers maim,
Who write Pindarics cold and lame,

And labour stiff Anacreontic Odes.

Ye lawful sons of genius, rise!
Of genuine title to the skies;

Ye founts of learning! and ye mints of fame!
You, who file off the mortal part
Of glowing thought, with Attic art,

And drink pure song from Cam's or Isis' stream.

The vessel that brought over the king.

STRAIN THE FIRST.

THE ARGUMENT.

How the king attended. A prospect of happiness. Industry. A surprising instance of it in old Rome. The mischief of sloth. What happiness is. Sloth its greatest enemy. Trade natural to Britain. Trade invoked. Described. What the greatest human excellence. The praise of wealth. Its use, abuse, end. The variety of Nature. The final moral cause of it. The benefit of man's necessities. Britain's naval stores. She makes all Nature serviceable to her ends. Of reason. Its excellence. How we should form our estimate of things. Rea. son's difficult task. Why the first glory hers. Her effects in old Britain.

"OUR monarch comes! nor comes alone!" What shining forms surround his throne, O Sun! as planets thee !-To my loud strain See Peace, by Wisdom led, advance; The Grace, the Muse, the Season, Dance; And Plenty spreads behind her flowing train !

"Our monarch comes! nor comes alone:" New glories kindle round his throne, The visions rise! I triumph as I gaze: By Pindar led, I turn'd of late

The volume dark, the folds of Fate; And, now, am present to the future blaze. By George and Jove it is decreed, The mighty Months in pomp proceed, Fair daughters of the Sun!-0 thou, divine, Blest Industry! a smiling Earth From thee alone derives its birth: By thee the ploughshare and its master shine. From thee, mast, cable, anchor, oar, From thee the cannon and his roar ; On oaks nurst, rear'd by thee, wealth, empire grow; O golden fruit! oak well might prove The sacred tree, the tree of Jove;

All Jove can give, the naval oak bestows.

What cannot industry complete?
When Punic war first flam'd, the great,
Bold, active, ardent, Roman fathers meet:

"Fell all your groves," a Flamen cries;
As soon they fall; as soon they rise;
One moon, a forest, and the next, a fleet.
Is sloth indulgence? 'T is a toil;
Enervates man, and damns the soil;
Defeats creation, plunges in distress,

Cankers our being, all devours;
A full exertion of our powers!
Thence, and thence only, glows our happiness.
The stream may stagnate, yet be clear,
The Sun suspend his swift career,

Yet healthy Nature feel her wonted force;
Ere man, his active springs resign'd,
Can rust in body and in mind,
Yet taste of bliss, of which he chokes the source.

Where, Industry! thy daughter fair?
Recal her to her native air;

Here, was Trade born, here bred, here flourish'd long;
And ever shall she flourish here:

What though she languish'd? 'twas but fear,
She's sound of heart; her constitution strong.

Wake, sting her up. Trade! lean no more
On thy fixt anchor, push from shore,
Earth lies before thee, every climate court.

And, see, she 's rous'd, absolv'd from fears,
Her brow, in cloudless azure, rears,
Spreads all her sail, and opens every port.
See, cherish'd by her sister, Peace,
She levies gain on every place,

Religion, habit, custom, tongue, and name;

Again, she travels with the Sun,
Again, she draws a golden zone

[fame!

Round Earth and main; bright zone of wealth and

Ten thousand active hands, that hung In shameful sloth with nerves unstrung, The nation's languid load, defy the storms, The sheets unfurl, and anchors weigh, The long-moor'd vessel wing to sea,

Worlds, worlds salute, and peopled Ocean swarms.

His sons, Po, Ganges, Danube, Nile,
Their sedgy foreheads lift, and smile;

Their urns inverted prodigally pour

Streams, charg'd with wealth, and vow to buy
Britannia for their great ally,

Happy the man! who, large of heart,
Has learnt the rare, illustrious art
Of being rich: stores starve us, or they cloy;
From gold, if more than chemic skill,
Extract not what is brighter still:
'Tis hard to gain, much harder to enjoy.

Plenty 's a means, and joy her end:
Exalted minds their joys extend:
A Chandos shines, when others' joys are done:
'As lofly turrets, by their height,

When humbler scenes resign their light,
Retain the rays of the declining Sun.

Pregnant with blessings, Britain! swear
No sordid son of thine shall dare
Offend the donor of thy wealth and peace;
Who now his whole creation drains
To pour into thy tumid veins

That blood of nations! commerce and increase.

How various Nature! turgid grain
Here nodding floats the golden plain;

There, worms weave silken webs; here, glowing vines
Lay forth their purple to the Sun,
Beneath the soil, there harvests run,

And kings' revenues ripen in the mines.

What's various Nature? Art divine
Man's soul to soften and refine;

Heaven different growths to different lands imparts,
That all may stand in need of all,
And interest draw around the ball,

With climes paid down; what can the gods do more? A net to catch and join all human hearts.

Cold Russia costly furs from far,
Hot China sends her painted jar,

France generous wines to crown it, Arab sweet
With gales of incense swells our sails,
Nor distant Ind our merchant fails,

Her richest ore the ballast of our fleet.

Luxuriant isle! What tide that flows,
Or stream that glides, or wind that blows,
Or genial Sun that shines, or shower that pours,
But flows, glides, breathes, shines, pours for
How every heart dilates to see
[thee?
Each land's each season blending on thy shores!

All these one British harvest make!
The servant Ocean for thy sake
Both sinks and swells: his arms thy bosom wrap,
And fondly give, in boundless dower,
To mighty George's growing power,
The wafted world into thy loaded lap.

Commerce brings riches, riches crown
Fair Virtue with the first renown:
A large revenue, and a large expense,

When hearts for others' welfare glow,
And spend as free as gods bestow,
Gives the full bloom to mortal excellence.

Glow then, my breast! abound, my store!
This, and this boldly I implore,
Their want and apathy let Stoics boast:

Passions and riches, good or ill,
As us'd by man, demand our skill;

All blessings wound us, when discretion's lost.

Wealth, in the virtuous and the wise,
'Tis vice and folly to despise :
Let those in praise of poverty refine,

Whose heads or hearts pervert its use,
The narrow-sould, or the profuse,
The truly-great find morals in the mine;

Thus has the great Creator's pen
His law supreme, to mortal men,
In their necessities distinctly writ:

E'en appetite supplies the place
Of absent virtue, absent grace,
And human want performs for human wit.
Vast naval ensigns strow'd around,
The wond'ring foreigner confound!
How stands the deep-aw'd continent aghast,
As her proud sceptred sons survey,
At every port, on every quay,
Huge mountains rise, of cable, anchor, mast!
The unwieldy tun! the ponderous bale !→→
Each prince his own clime set to sale

Sees here, by subjects of a British king:

How Earth's abridg'd! all nations range
A narrow spot, our throng'd Exchange!
And send the streams of plenty from their spring.
Nor Earth alone, all Nature bends
In aid to Britain's glorious ends:
Toils she in trade? or bleeds in honest wars?
Her keel each yielding sea enthrals,
Each willing wind her canvass calls,
Her pilot into service lists the stars.

In size confin'd, and humbly made,
What though we creep beneath the shade,
And seem as emmets on this point, the ball?
Heaven lighted-up the human soul,
Heaven bid its rays transpierce the whole,
And, giving godlike reason, gave us all.

Thou golden chain 'twixt God and men,
Blest Reason! guide my life and pen,
All ills, like ghosts, fly trembling at thy light:
Who thee obeys, reigns over all;
Smiles, though the stars around him fall;
A God is nought but reason infinite.

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