May no foes ravish thee, and no false friend
Betray thee, while professing to defend !
Prize it, ye ministers; ye monarchs, spare;
Ye patriots, guard it with a miser's care.

335

A. Patriots, alas! the few that have been found, Where most they flourish, upon English ground, The country's need have scantily supplied,

And the last left the scene, when Chatham died.
B. Not so the virtue still adorns our age,
Though the chief actor died upon the stage.
In him Demosthenes was heard again;
Liberty taught him her Athenian strain:
She cloth'd him with authority and awe,

Spoke from his lips, and in his looks gave law.
His speech, his form, his action, full of grace,
And all his country beaming in his face,
He stood, as some inimitable hand

340

345

Would strive to make a Paul or Tully stand.
No sycophant or slave, that dar'd oppose
Her sacred cause, but trembled when he rose ;
And ev'ry venal stickler for the yoke

350

Felt himself crush'd at the first word he spoke.

Such men are rais'd to station and command,
When Providence means mercy to a land.
He speaks, and they appear to him they owe
Skill to direct, and strength to strike the blow;
To manage with address, to seize with pow'r
The crisis of a dark decisive hour.

355

So Gideon earn'd a victory not his own;
Subserviency his praise, and that alone.

360

Poor England! thou art a devoted deer,

Beset with every ill but that of fear.

Thee nations hunt; all mark thee for a prey;

They swarm around thee, and thou stand'st at bay. 365 Undaunted still, though wearied and perplex'd,

Once Chatham sav'd thee; but who saves thee next?

Alas! the tide of pleasure sweeps along

All, that should be the boast of British song.

TABLE TALK.

"Tis not the wreath, that once adorn'd thy brow,
The prize of happier times, will serve thee now.
Our ancestry, a gallant, Christian race,
Patterns of ev'ry virtue, ev'ry grace,

Confes'd a God; they kneel'd before they fought,
And prais'd him in the victories he wrought.
Now from the dust of ancient days bring forth
Their sober zeal, integrity, and worth;
Courage ungrac'd by these, affronts the skies,
Is but the fire without the sacrifice.

The stream, that feeds the well-spring of the heart, 330
Not more invigorates life's noblest part,

Than Virtue quickens with a warmth divine
The pow'rs that Sin has brought to a decline.

A. Th' inestimable Estimate of Brown
Rose like a paper kite, and charm'd the town;
But measures, plann'd and executed well,
Shifted the wind that raised it, and it fell.
He trod the very self-same ground you tread,
And Victory refuted all he said.

385

B. And yet his judgment was not fram'd amiss; 390 Its errour, if it err'd, was merely this

He thought the dying hour already come,
And a complete recov'ry struck him dumb.
But that effeminacy, folly, lust,
Enervate and enfeeble, and needs must;
And that a nation shamefully debas'd
Will be despis'd and trampled on at last,
Unless sweet Penitence her pow'rs renew;
Is truth, if history itself be true.

There is a time and Justice marks the date,
For long-forbearing clemency to wait;
That hour elaps'd th' incurable revolt
Is punish'd, and down comes the thunderbolt.
If mercy then put by the threat'ning blow,
Must she perform the same kind office now?
May she? and if offended Heav'n be still
Accessible, and pray'r prevail, she will.

395

400

405

"Tis not, however, insolence and noise,
The tempest of tumultuary joys,
Nor is it yet despondence and dismay
Will win her visits, or engage her stay;

410

Pray'r only, and the penitential tear,

Can call her smiling down, and fix her here.

But when a country, (one that I could name,)

In prostitution sinks the sense of shame;
When infamous Venality, grown bold,
Writes on his bosom, To be let or sold ;
When Perjury, that Heav'n-defying vice,
Sells oaths by tale, and at the lowest price,
Stamps God's own name upon a lie just made,
To turn a penny in the way of trade;

415

420

When Avrice starves, (and never hides his face,)
Two or three millions of the human race,

And not a tongue inquires, how, where, or when, Though conscience will have twinges now and then; When profanation of the sacred cause,

426

In all its parts, times, ministry, and laws,
Bespeaks a land, once Christian, fall'n and lost,

In all, but wars against that title most;

What follows next let cities of great name,

430

And regions long since, desolate, proclaim.
Nineveh, Babylon, and ancient Rome,

Speak to the present times, and times to come;
They cry aloud in ev'ry careless ear,

Stop while you may; suspend your mad career;

435

O learn from our example and our fate,

Learn wisdom and repentance ere too late.
Not only Vice disposes and prepares

The mind, that slumbers sweetly in her snares,
To stoop to Tyranny's usurp'd command,
And bend her polish'd neck beneath his hand,
(A dire effect, by one of Nature's laws,
Unchangeably connected with its cause ;)
But Providence himself will intervene,

440

To throw his dark displeasure o'er the scene.

445

All are his instruments; each form of war,
What burns at home, or threatens from afar :
Nature in arms, her elements at strife,
The storms that overset the joys of life,

Are but his rods to scourge a guilty land,

450

And waste it at the bidding of his hand.

He gives the word, and Mutiny soon roars

In all her gates, and shakes her distant shores;
The standards of all nations are unfurl'd;

She has one foe, and that one foe the world.

455

And, if he doom that people with a frown,

And mark them with a seal of wrath press'd down,

Obduracy takes place : callous and tough,

The reprobated race grows judgment proof;

Earth shakes beneath them, and Heav'n roars above; 460
But nothing scares them from the course they love.
To the lascivious pipe and wanton song,

That charm down fear, they frolick it along,

With mad rapidity and unconcern,

Down to the gulf, from which is no return.
They trust in navies, and their navies fail-
God's curse can cast away ten thousand sail!
They trust in armies, and their courage dies;
In wisdom, wealth, in fortune, and in lies;
But all they trust in, withers, as it must,

465

470

When He commands, in whom they place no trust.

Vengeance at last pours down upon their coast

A long despis'd, but now victorious, host;
Tyranny sends the chain, that must abridge
The noble sweep of all their privilege;
Gives liberty the last, the mortal shock:
Slips the slave's collar on, and snaps the lock.

475

A. Such lofty strains embellish what you teach,

Mean you to prophesy, or but to preach ?

B. I know the mind that feels indeed the fire The muse imparts, and can command the lyre, Acts with a force and kindles with a zeal, Whate'er the theme, that others never feel.

430

If human woes her soft attention claim,
A tender sympathy pervades the frame;
She pours a sensibility divine

Along the nerves of every feeling line.

But if a deed nɔt tamely to be bɔrnə

Fire indignation and a sense of scorn,

485

The strings are swept with such a pow'r so loud, 490 The storm of musick shakes th' astonish'd crowd.

So, when remote futurity is brought

Before the keen inquiry of her thought,

A terrible sagacity informs

The poet's heart; he looks to distant storms;

495

He hears the thunder ere the tempest low'rs;

And, arm'd with strength surpassing human pow'rs,
Seizes events as yet unknown to man,

And darts his soul into the dawning plan.

Hence in a Roman mouth, the graceful name

500

Of prophet and of poet was the same;

Hence, British poets, too, the priesthood shar'd,
And every hallow'd druid was a bard.

But no prophetick fires to me belong ;

I play with syllables, and sport in song.

505

A. At Westminster, where little poets strive

To set a distich upon six and five,

Where Discipline helps th' op'ning buds of sense,

And makes his pupils proud with silver pence,

I was a poet too but modern taste

510

Is so refin'd, and delicate, and chaste,

That verse, whatever fire the fancy warms,
Without a creamy smoothness has no charms.
Thus, all success depending on an ear,
And thinking I might purchase it too dear,
If sentiment were sacrific'd to sound,
And truth cut short to make a period round,

515

I judg'd a man of sense could scarce do worse,
Than caper in the morris-dance of verse.

B. Thus reputation is a spur to wit,
And some wits flag through fear of losing it.

520