Still labours glorious with some great design.

Low walks the sun, and broadens by degrees, Just o'er the verge of day. The shifting clouds Assembled gay, a richly-gorgeous train,

In all their pomp attend his setting throne.
Air, earth, and ocean smile immense. And now,
As if his weary chariot sought the bowers
Of Amphitrite, and her tending nymphs,
(So Grecian fable sung) he dips his orb ;
Now half-immers'd; and now a golden curve
Gives one bright glance, then total disappears.
For ever running an inchanted round,
Passes the day, deceitful, vain, and void;
As fleets the vision o'er the formful brain,
This moment hurrying wild th' impassion'd soul,
The next in nothing lost. "Tis so to him,
The dreamer of this earth, an idle blank :
A sight of horror to the cruel wretch,
Who all day long in sordid pleasure roll'd,
Himself an useless. load, has squander'd vile,
Upon his scoundrel train, what might have chear'd
A drooping family of modest worth.

But to the generous still improving mind

That gives the hopeless heart to sing for joy,

Diffusing kind beneficence around,

Boastless, as now descends the silent dew;

To him the long review of order'd life

Is inward rapture, only to be felt.

Confess'd from yonder slow-extinguish'd clouds, All ether soft'ning, sober Evening takes Her wonted station in the middle air ;

A thousand shadows at her beck. First this
She sends on earth; then that of deeper dye
Steals soft behind; and then a deeper still,
In circle following circle, gathers round,
To close the face of things. A fresher gale
Begins to wave the wood, and stir the stream,
Sweeping with shadowy gust the fields of corn;
While the quail clamours for his running mate.
Wide o'er the thistly lawn as swells the breeze,
A whitening shower of vegetable down
Amusive floats. The kind impartial care

Of Nature naught disdains : Thoughtful to feed
Her lowest sons, and clothe the coming year,
From field to field the feather'd seeds she wings.
His folded flock secure, the shepherd home
Hies, merry-hearted; and by turns relieves
The ruddy milk-maid of her brimming pail;
The beauty whom perhaps his witless heart,
Unknowing what the joy-mix'd anguish means,
Sincerely loves, by that best language shewn
Of cordial glances, and obliging deeds.
Onward they pass,
o'er many a panting height,
And valley sunk, and unfrequented; where
At fall of Eve the fairy people throng,
In various game, and revelry, to pass
The summer-night, as village-stories tell.
But far about they wander from the grave
Of him, whom his ungentle fortune urg'd
Against his own sad breast to lift the hand
Of impious violence. The lonely tower
Is also shun'd; whose mournful chambers hold

So night-struck fancy dreams, the yelling ghost.
Among the crooked lanes, on every hedge,
The glow-worm lights his gem; and, thro' the dark,
A moving radiance twinkles. Evening yields
The world to Night; not in her winter-robe
Of massy Stygian woof, but loose array'd
In mantle dun. A faint erroneous ray,
Glanc'd from th' imperfect surfaces of things,
Flings half an image on the straining eye;

While wavering woods, and villages, and streams,
And rocks and mountain-tops, that long retain'd
Th' ascending gleam, are all one swimming scene,
Uncertain if beheld. Sudden to heaven

Thence weary vision turns; where, leading soft
The silent hours of love; with purest ray
Sweet Venus shines, and from her genial rise,
When day-light sickens till it springs afresh,
Unrival'd reigns, the fairest lamp of night.
As thus th' effulgence tremulous I drink,
With cherish'd gaze, the lambent lightnings shoot
Across the sky; or horizontal dart,

In wondrous shapes: By fearful murmuring crouds,
Portentous deem'd. Amid the radiant orbs,
That more than deck, that animate the sky,
The life-infusing suns of other worlds;
Lo! from the dread immensity of space
Returning, with accelerated course,
The rushing comet to the sun descends :
And as he sinks below the shading earth,
With awful train projected o'er the heavens,
The guilty nations tremble. But, above

(spurns

Those superstitious horrors that enslave
The fond sequacious herd, to mystic faith,
And blind amazement prone, th' enlighten'd few,
Whose godlike minds philosophy exalts,
The glorious stranger hail. They feel a joy
Divinely great; they in their powers exult,
That wondrous force of thought, which mounting
This dusky spot, and measures all the sky;
While, from his far excursion thro' the wilds
Of barren ether, faithful to his time,
They see the blazing wonder rise anew,
In seeming terror clad, but kindly bent
To work the will of all-sustaining LOVE :
From his huge vapory train perhaps to shake.
Reviving moisture on the numerous orbs,
Thro' which his long ellipsis winds; perhaps
To lend new fuel to declining suns,

To light up worlds, and feed th' eternal fire.
With thee, serene PHILOSOPHY, with thee,
And thy bright garland, let me crown my song!
Effusive source of evidence, and truth!

A lustre shedding o'er th' ennobled mind,
Sronger than summer-noon; and pure as that,
Whose mild vibrations soothe the parted soul,
New to the dawning of celestial day.

Hence thro' her nourish'd powers, enlarg'd by thee,
She springs aloft, with elevated pride,

Above the tangling mass of low desires,

That bind the fluttering croud; and, angel-wing'd,

The heights of science and of virtue gains,

Where all is calm and clear: With Nature round,
Or in the starry regions, or th' abyss,
To Reason's and to Fancy's eye display'd:
The first up-tracing, from the dreary void,
The chain of causes and effects to HIM,
The world-producing ESSENCE, who alone]
Possesses being; while the last receives
The whole magnificence of heaven and earth,
And every beauty, delicate or bold,
Obvious or more remote, with livelier sense,
Diffusive painted on the rapid mind.

Tutor❜d by thee, hence POETRY exalts
Her voice to ages; and informs the page
With music, image, sentiment, and thought,
Never to die! the treasure of mankind!
Their highest honour, and the truest joy!

Without thee what were unenlighten'd Man ?
A savage roaming thro' the woods and wilds,
In quest of prey; and with th' unfashioned fur
Rough clad; devoid of every finer art,
And elegance of life. Nor happiness
Domestic, mix'd of tenderness and care,
Nor moral excellence, nor social bliss,
No guardian law were his; nor various skill
To turn the furrow, or to guide the tool
Mechanic; nor the heaven-conducted prow
Of navigation bold, that fearless braves
The burning line, or dares the wint❜ry pole;
Mother severe of infinite delights!

Nothing, save rapine, indolence, and guile,