НЕ merchant, to secure
his treasure, Conveys it in a borrow'd name; Euphelia serves to grace my measure, But Cloe is my real flame.
My softest verse, my darling lyre
Upon Euphelia's toilet lay —
When Cloe noted her desire
That I should sing, that I should play.
My lyre I tune, my voice I raise,
But with my numbers mix my sighs ;
And whilst I sing Euphelia's praise,
I fix my soul on Cloe's eyes.
Fair Cloe blush'd : Euphelia frown'd :
I sung, and gazed ; I play'd, and trembled :
And Venus to the Loves around
Remark'd how ill we all dissembled.
M. Prior
HEN lovely woman stoops to folly
What charm can soothe her melancholy,
What art can wash her guilt away?
The only art her guilt to cover,
To hide her shame from every eye,
To give repentance to her lover
And wring his bosom, is
to die.
0. Goldsmith
TE banks and braes o’ bonnie Doon
bloom sae fair! How can ye chant, ye little birds,
And I sae fu' o' care !
Thou 'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird
That sings upon the bough;
Thou minds me o' the happy days
When my fause Luve was true.
Thou 'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird
That sings beside thy mate;
For sae I sat, and sae I sang,
And wist na o'
my fate.
Aft hae I roved by bonnie Doon
To see the woodbine twine,
And ilka bird sang o'its love ;
And sae did I o' mine.
Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose,
Frae aff its thorny tree;
And my fause luver staw the rose,
But left the thorn wi' me.
R. Burns
A "And give to rapture all was erembling strings
From Helicon's harmonious springs
A thousand rills their mazy progress take : The laughing flowers that round them blow Drink life and fragrance as they flow. Now the rich stream of Music winds along Deep, majestic, smooth, and strong, Through verdant vales, and Ceres' golden reign ; Now rolling down the steep amain Headlong, impetuous, see it pour : The rocks and nodding groves re-bellow to the roar.
O Sovereign of the willing soul,
Parent of sweet and solemn-breathing airs,
Enchanting shell ! the sullen Cares
And frantic Passions hear thy soft control.
On Thracia's hills the Lord of War
Has curb'd the fury of his car
And dropt his thirsty lance at thy command.
Perching on the sceptred hand
Of Jove, thy magic lulls the feather’d king
With ruffled plumes, and flagging wing :
Quench'd in dark clouds of slumber lie
The terror of his beak, and lightnings of his eye.
Thee the voice, the dance, obey
Temper’d to thy warbled lay.
O'er Idalia's velvet-green
The rosy-crowned Loves are seen
On Cytherea's day,
With antic Sport, and blue-eyed Pleasures,
Frisking light in frolic measures ;
Now pursuing, now retreating,
Now in circling troops they meet :
To brisk notes in cadence beating
Glance their many-twinkling feet.
Slow melting strains their Queen's approach declare :
Where'er she turns the Graces homage pay :
With arms sublime that float upon the air
In gliding state she wins her easy way :
O’er her warm cheek and rising bosom move
The bloom of young Desire and purple light of Love.
Man's feeble race what ills await!
Labour, and Penury, the racks of Pain,
Disease, and Sorrow's weeping train,
And Death, sad refuge from the storms of Fate !
The fond complaint, my song, disprove,
And justify the laws of Jove.
Say, has he given in vain the heavenly Muse ?
Night, and all her sickly dews,
Her spectres wan, and birds of boding cry
He gives to range the dreary sky:
Till down the eastern cliffs afar
Hyperion's march they spy, and glittering shafts of war.
In climes beyond the solar road
Where shaggy forms o'er ice-built mountains roam,
The Muse has broke the twilight gloom
To cheer the shivering native's dull abode.
And oft, beneath the odorous shade
Of Chili's boundless forests laid,
She deigns to hear the savage youth repeat
In loose numbers wildly sweet
Their feather-cinctured chiefs, and dusky loves.
Her track, where'er the Goddess roves,
Glory pursue, and generous Shame,
Th' unconquerable Mind, and Freedom's holy flame.
Woods, that wave o'er Delphi's steep,
Isles, that crown th’ Aegean deep,
Fields that cool Ilissus laves
Or where Maeander's amber waves
In lingering lab'rinths creep,
How do your tuneful echoes languish,
Mute, but to the voice of anguish!
Where each old poetic mountain
Inspiration breathed around;
Every shade and hallow'd fountain
Murmur'd deep a solemn sound :
Till the sad Nine, in Greece's evil hour,
Left their Parnassus for the Latian plains.
Alike they scorn the pomp of tyrant Power,
And coward Vice, that revels in her chains. When Latium had her lofty spirit lost, They sought, O Albion ! next, thy sea-encircled coast.
Far from the sun and summer-gale
In thy green lap was Nature's Darling laid,
What time, where lucid Avon stray'd,
To him the mighty Mother did unveil
Her awful face : the dauntless Child
Stretch'd forth his little arms, and smiled.
This pencil take (she said), whose colours clear
Richly paint the vernal year :
Thine, too, these golden keys, immortal Boy!
This can unlock the gates of Joy ;
Of Horror that, and thrilling Fears,
Or
ope
the sacred source of sympathetic Tears.
Nor second He, that rode sublime Upon the seraph-wings of Ecstasy The secrets of the Abyss to spy :
He pass’d the flaming bounds of Place and Time : The living Throne, the sapphire-blaze Where Angels tremble while they gaze,
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