Lead us to solid wrong;

We pray God our friends' torments to prolong,
And wish uncharitably for them

To be as long a dying as Methusalem;

The ripened soul longs from his prison to come, But we would seal and sew up, if we could, the

womb ;

We seek to close and plaster up by art

The cracks and breaches of the extended shell,
And in that narrow cell

Would rudely force to dwell

The noble vigorous bird already winged to part.

(Cowley.)

ELEGIAC POEMS.

EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.

ESSAY ON MAN.

EAVEN from all creatures hides the book

of fate,

All but the page prescribed, their present

state;

From brutes what men, from men what spirits know : Or who could suffer being here below?

The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day,

Had he thy reason, would he skip and play?
Pleased to the last, he crops the flowery food,
And licks the hand just raised to shed his blood.
O blindness to the future! kindly given,
That each may fill the circle marked by Heaven,
Who sees with equal eye, as God of all,
A hero perish, or a sparrow fall,

Atoms or systems into ruin hurled,

And now a bubble burst, and now a world.
Hope humbly then; with trembling pinions soar;
Wait the great teacher Death; and God adore.