The Library | Page 5

reverend friends--farewell!
Near these, and where the setting sun displays,
Through the dim
window, his departing rays,
And gilds yon columns, there, on either
side,
The huge Abridgments of the LAW abide;
Fruitful as vice the
dread correctors stand,
And spread their guardian terrors round the
land;
Yet, as the best that human care can do
Is mix'd with error, oft
with evil too,
Skill'd in deceit, and practised to evade,
Knaves stand
secure, for whom these laws were made,
And justice vainly each
expedient tries,
While art eludes it, or while power defies.
"Ah!
happy age," the youthful poet sings,
"When the free nations knew not
laws nor kings,
When all were blest to share a common store,
And
none were proud of wealth, for none were poor,
No wars nor tumults
vex'd each still domain,
No thirst of empire, no desire of gain;
No
proud great man, nor one who would be great,
Drove modest merit
from its proper state;
Nor into distant climes would Avarice roam,

To fetch delights for Luxury at home:
Bound by no ties which kept
the soul in awe,
They dwelt at liberty, and love was law!"
"Mistaken youth! each nation first was rude,
Each man a cheerless
son of solitude,

To whom no joys of social life were known,
None
felt a care that was not all his own;
Or in some languid clime his
abject soul
Bow'd to a little tyrant's stern control;
A slave, with
slaves his monarch's throne he raised,
And in rude song his ruder idol

praised;
The meaner cares of life were all he knew;
Bounded his
pleasures, and his wishes few;
But when by slow degrees the Arts
arose,
And Science waken'd from her long repose;
When
Commerce, rising from the bed of ease,
Ran round the land, and
pointed to the seas;
When Emulation, born with jealous eye,
And
Avarice, lent their spurs to industry;
Then one by one the numerous
laws were made,
Those to control, and these to succour trade;
To
curb the insolence of rude command,
To snatch the victim from the
usurer's hand;
To awe the bold, to yield the wrong'd redress,
And
feed the poor with Luxury's excess." {3}
Like some vast flood, unbounded, fierce, and strong,
His nature leads
ungovern'd man along;
Like mighty bulwarks made to stem that tide,

The laws are form'd, and placed on ev'ry side;
Whene'er it breaks
the bounds by these decreed,
New statutes rise, and stronger laws
succeed;
More and more gentle grows the dying stream,
More and
more strong the rising bulwarks seem;
Till, like a miner working sure
and slow,
Luxury creeps on, and ruins all below;
The basis sinks,
the ample piles decay;
The stately fabric, shakes and falls away;

Primeval want and ignorance come on,
But Freedom, that exalts the
savage state, is gone.
Next, HISTORY ranks;--there full in front she lies,
And every nation
her dread tale supplies;
Yet History has her doubts, and every age

With sceptic queries marks the passing page;
Records of old nor later
date are clear,
Too distant those, and these are placed too near;

There time conceals the objects from our view,
Here our own
passions and a writer's too:
Yet, in these volumes, see how states
arose!
Guarded by virtue from surrounding foes;
Their virtue lost,
and of their triumphs vain,
Lo! how they sunk to slavery again!

Satiate with power, of fame and wealth possess'd,
A nation grows too
glorious to be blest;
Conspicuous made, she stands the mark of all,

And foes join foes to triumph in her fall.

Thus speaks the page that paints ambition's race,
The monarch's pride,
his glory, his disgrace;
The headlong course, that madd'ning heroes
run,
How soon triumphant, and how soon undone;
How slaves,
turn'd tyrants, offer crowns to sale,
And each fall'n nation's
melancholy tale.
Lo! where of late the Book of Martyrs stood,
Old pious tracts, and
Bibles bound in wood;
There, such the taste of our degenerate age,

Stand the profane delusions of the STAGE:
Yet virtue owns the
TRAGIC MUSE a friend,
Fable her means, morality her end;
For
this she rules all passions in their turns,
And now the bosom bleeds,
and now it burns;
Pity with weeping eye surveys her bowl,
Her
anger swells, her terror chills the soul;
She makes the vile to virtue
yield applause,
And own her sceptre while they break her laws;
For
vice in others is abhorr'd of all,
And villains triumph when the
worthless fall.
Not thus her sister COMEDY prevails,
Who shoots at Folly, for her
arrow fails;
Folly, by Dulness arm'd, eludes the wound,
And
harmless sees the feather'd shafts rebound;
Unhurt she stands,
applauds the archer's skill,
Laughs at her malice, and is Folly still.

Yet well the Muse portrays, in fancied scenes,
What pride will stoop
to, what profession means;
How formal fools the farce of state
applaud;
How caution watches at the lips of fraud;
The wordy
variance of domestic life;
The tyrant husband, the retorting wife;

The snares for innocence, the lie of trade,
And the smooth tongue's
habitual masquerade.
With her the Virtues too obtain a place,
Each gentle passion, each
becoming grace;
The social joy in life's securer road,
Its easy
pleasure, its substantial good;
The happy thought that conscious
virtue gives,
And all that ought to live, and all that lives.
But who are these? Methinks a noble mien
And awful grandeur in

their