Then age and want, O, ill-match'd pair! Show Man was made to mourn.

A few seem favourites of fate,
In pleasure's lap carest;

Yet, think not all the rich and great
Are likewise truly blest.

But, oh! what crowds in ev'ry land
Are wretched and forlorn.

Thro' weary life this lesson learn,
That Man was made to mourn.

Many and sharp the numʼrous ills
Inwoven with our frame!
More pointed still we make ourselves,
Regret, remorse, and shame!
And man, whose heav'n-erected face
The smiles of love adorn,

Man's inhumanity to man

Makes countless thousands mourn

See yonder poor, o'erlabour'd wight,

So abject, mean, and vile, Who begs a brother of the earth

To give him leave to toil;

!

And see his lordly fellow-worm

The poor petition spurn, Unmindful, tho' a weeping wife And helpless offspring mourn.

If I'm design'd yon lordling's slave -
By Nature's law design'd,
Why was an independent wish

E'er planted in my mind?

If not, why am I subject to
His cruelty or scorn?

Or why has man the will and pow'r
To make his fellow mourn?

Yet, let not this too much, my son,
Disturb thy youthful breast:
This partial view of human kind
Is surely not the last !
The poor, oppressed, honest man

Had never, sure, been born,

Had there not been some recompense
To comfort those that mourn!

O death! the poor man's dearest friend, The kindest and the best!

Welcome the hour my aged limbs
Are laid with thee at rest!

The great, the wealthy, fear thy blow
From pomp and pleasure torn;

But, oh! a blest relief to those
That weary-laden mourn!

TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY,

ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH THE PLOUGH, IN APRIL, 1786.

EE, modest, crimson-tipped flow'r,
Thou's met me in an evil hour;
For I maun crush amang the stoure
Thy slender stem :
thee now is past my pow'r,
Thou bonnie gem.

To

spare

Alas! it's no thy neebor sweet,
The bonnie Lark, companion meet!
Bending thee 'mang the dewy weet!
Wi' spreckl'd breast,

When upward-springing, blythe, to greet
The purpling east.

Cauld blew the bitter-biting north
Upon thy early, humble birth;

Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth
Amid the storm,

Scarce rear'd above thy parent-earth
Thy tender form.

The flaunting flow'rs our gardens yield
High shelt'ring woods and wa's maun shield,
But thou beneath the random bield

O' clod, or stane,

Adorns the histie stibble-field,

Unseen, alane.

There, in thy scanty mantle clad,
Thy suawy bosom sunward spread,
Thou lifts thy unassuming head
In humble guise;

But now the share uptears thy bed,
And low thou lies!

Such is the fate of artless Maid,
Sweet flow'ret of the rural shade!

By love's simplicity betray'd,

And guileless trust,

Till she, like thee, all soil'd, is laid
Low i' the dust.

Such is the fate of simple Bard,
On life's rough ocean luckless starr'd !
Unskilful he to note the card

Of prudent lore,

Till billows rage, and gales blow hard,
And whelm him o'er!

Such fate to suffering worth is giv'n,
Who long with wants and woes has striv❜n,
By human pride or cunning driv❜n

To mis'ry's brink,

Till, wrench'd of ev'ry stay but Heav'n,
He, ruin'd, sink!

Ev'n thou who mourn'st the Daisy's fate,
That fate is thine -no distant date;
Stern Ruin's ploughshare drives, elate,
Full on thy bloom,

Till crush'd beneath the furrow's weight
Shall be thy doom!