English

When freed from Envy's Rage,
Great Harvey left th' unthankful Age,
Commanded to bestow
Immortal Youth on Hero's Shades below.
'Twas then, the pitying Pow'rs which all foresee,

Did thee most learned Garth decree,
Nature's Secrets to explore,
To give us Ease, our Health restore,
And lash our Mirmil's dull Degen'racy.
Soon from their Cells, the latent Seeds advance,

And frame a sacred mystick Dance:
Here sympathetick Accents shine,
There others healing and divine;

Garth's the Subject of my Song!
To Garth, our Praises all belong!
Garth, who merits all Esteem!
The Patient's Joy, the Poet's Theain:
But Oh! whose daring Pen can tell
What does our highest Praise excel,
And in a noble flowing Verse,
The Wonders of his Art rehearse?
In vain we strive, in vain press on,
To reach the dazling Height;
'Tis such a Genius as his own
Alone must do him Right;
Where Wit with brighest Lustre shines,
And Paan with Minerva joins.

Let others Phaebus Aid require
To sing their Hero's Fame,
No sacred Pow'r will I invoke,
But Dryden's awful Nime.
The wond'rous Man great Dryden knew,
Admir'd his Worth, and lov'd him too;
And in sweet Notes would still commend
The Æsculapius and the Friend.
Oh venerable Shade! my Wishes hear,
And help me sing the Man whom you esteem'd so dear.

MELKOS

The old dull whisper of the unceasing wave.
The slow sound of the unceasing wave.

Out of these shadowy hollows of the ocean
Troop the grey dreams that plague the minds of men.
Far off Hadranos hears: Enkelados
Puts forth his hands and shapes the sound to thought:
And on her lonely Mount where the sunset burns
Hybla remoulds in pale invisible flame.

I am too old to fear these Holy Ones.
Hybla Beneficent, why should one fear
The Twilight Goddess, born where the Evening star

See, see, how evening's sloping shadows grow
Upon the massy nave, and all the stone
Is flecked with little clouds of colour, thrown
From the west window; on the ground they go,
Silently creeping eastward, while the air
Thickens within the choir, and so conceals
The altar, whose benignant Presence there
The slowly rocking lamp alone reveals.
Ah me, how still. Our Lady's Vesper-song
Hath died away amid the choral throng;
But, the pure-visaged moon, that climbs elate
The throne of day, now strikes with trembling light

His eye, so seemed it in his slumber, strove
To pierce the gloomy pinewood, where it stretched,
In misty length, a single sombre nave;
While, one behind another ranged, the rings
Of fireflies swung in circles of green light,
Like rocking lamps suspended from a roof.
There, suddenly among the boughs, the wind
Breathed a last sigh, and with it swept away
Those living stars, and all was silence round,
The silentness of an expecting dream.
Then, at the close of that cathedral nave,
A white and radiant vapour softly grew,

Ah wretched Israel ! ah unhappy state!
Expos'd to all the Bolts of angry Fate!
Expos'd to all thy Enemies revengeful hate!
Who is there left their Fury to withstand?
What Champions now to guard thy helpless Land?
Who is there left in listed Fields to head
Thy valiant Youth, and lead them on to Victory?
Alas! thy valiant Youth are dead,

Ah, worthy Prince! would I for thee had dyed!
Ah, would I had thy fatal place supplied!
I'd then repaid a Life, which to thy gift I owe,
Repaid a Crown, which Friendship taught thee to forgo;
Both Debts, I ne'er can cancel now:
Oh, dearer than my Soul! if I can call it mine,
For sure we had the same, 'twas very thine,
Dearer than Light, or Life, or Fame,
Or Crowns, or any thing, that I can wish, or think, or name:
Brother thou wast, but wast my Friend before,
And that new Title then could add no more:

Oh Death! how vast an Harvest hast thou reap'd of late!
Never before hadst thou so great,
Ne'er drunk'st before so deep of Jewish Blood,
Ne're since th'embattled Hosts at Gibean stood;
When three' whole days took up the work of Fate,
When a large Tribe enter'd at once thy Bill,
And threescore thousand Victims to thy Fury fell.

Mourn, wretched Israel , mourn thy Monarch's fall,
And all thy plenteous stock of sorrow call,
T'attend his pompous Funeral:
Mourn each, who in this loss an int'rest shares,
Lavish your Grief, exhaust it all in Tears:
You Hebrew Virgins too,
Who once in lofty strains did his glad Triumphs sing,
Bring all your artful Notes, and skilful Measures now,
Each charming air of Breath and string,