Alas! regardless of their doom, The little victims play! No sense have they of ills to come, Nor care beyond to-day; Yet see how all around 'em wait The ministers of human fate, And black Misfortune's baleful train! Ah! shew them where in ambush stand, To seize their prey, the murd'rous band! Ah! tell them they are men. These shall the fury passions tear, And Shame, that skulks behind ; That inly gnaws the secret heart! Ambition this shall tempt to rise, And grinning Infamy: The stings of Falsehood those shall try, And hard Unkindness' alter'd eye, That mocks the tear it forc'd to flow; And keen Remorse, with blood defil'd, And moody Madness laughing wild Amid severest woe. Lo! in the vale of years beneath, The painful family of Death, More hideous than their queen: This racks the joints, this fires the veins, Lo! Poverty, to fill the band, To each his suff'rings; all are men Th' unfeeling for his own. Yet ah! why should they know their fate, And Happiness too swiftly flies? DA ODE. To Adversity. AUGHTER of Jove, relentless pow'r, The proud are taught to taste of pain! With pangs unfelt before, unpity'd and alone. When first thy sire to send on earth What sorrow was thou bad'st her know, And, from her own, she learnt to melt at others' woe, Scar'd at thy frown terrific, fly With Laughter, Noise, and thoughtless Joy, And leave us leisure to be good. Light they disperse; and with them go The summer friend, the flatt'ring foe; By vain Prosperity receiv'd, To her they vow their truth, and are again believ'd. Wisdom, in simple garb array'd, Immers'd in rapt'rous thought profound, And Melancholy, silent maid, With leaden eye, that loves the ground Warm Charity, the gen'ral friend, And Pity, dropping soft the sadly-pleasing tear. Oh! gently on thy suppliant's head, Dread Goddess! lay thy chast'ning hand, Not in thy Gorgon terrors clad, Nor circled with thy vengeful band: (As by the impious thou art seen) With thund'ring voice and threat'ning mien, Thy form benign, O Goddess! wear, Thy milder influence impart, Thy philosophic train be there, To soften, not to wound my heart: The gen'rous spark extinct revive; Teach me to love and to forgive; Exact my own defects to scan, What others are to feel, and know myself a man, 'R' ODE. The Bard. Pindaric. I. 1. UIN seize thee, ruthless King! Tho' fann'd by conquest's crimson wing, Such were the sounds that o'er the crested pride As down the steep of Snowdon's shaggy side I. 2. On a rock, whose haughty brow Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood, With haggard eye the poet stood; Stream'd like a meteor to the troubled air,) 'Hark how each giant oak and desert cave To high-born Hoel's harp or soft Llewellyn's lay. I. 3. Cold is Cadwallo's tongue, That hush'd the stormy main; Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed: Mountains! ye mourn in vain Modred, whose magic song Made huge Plinlimmon bow his cloud-topp'd head. On dreary Arvon's shore they lie, Smear'd with gore, and ghastly pale; Far, far aloof th' affrighted ravens sail, No more I weep. They do not sleep; I see them sit; they linger yet, With me in dreadful harmony they join, And weave with bloody hands the tissue of thy line." II. 1. "Weave the warp and weave the woof, Mark the year, and mark the night When Severn shall re-echo with affright The shrieks of death thro' Berkley's roofs that ring, She-wolf of France, with unrelenting fangs Amazement in his van, with Flight combin'd, II. 2. Mighty victor, mighty lord, Low ou his fun'ral couch he lies! No pitying heart, no eye, afford Is the sable warrior fled ? Thy son is gone; he rests among the dead. Fair laughs the morn, and soft the zephyr blows, Youth on the prow and pleasure at the helm, |