Can the deep statesman, skill'd in great design, No:-though the palace bar her golden gate, Or monarchs plant ten thousand guards around; Unerring, and unseen, the shaft of fate Strikes the devoted victim to the ground! What then avails Ambition's wide-stretch'd wing, The Macedonian monarch, wise and good, Though glory spread thy name from pole to pole; So, Saladin, for arts and arms renown'd, And as he rode, high in his regal ear, In all the purple pride of conquest dress'd; Conspicuous o'er the trophies gain'd in war, Plac'd, pendant on a spear, his burial vest: While thus the herald cried-"This son of power, Boast of no other spoil but yonder shroud!' Search where Ambition rag'd, with rigour steel'd; Where Slaughter like the rapid lightning ran; And say, while Memory weeps the blood-stain'd field, Where lies the chief, and where the common man? Vain then are pyramids, and motto'd stones, And monumental trophies rais'd on high! Rests not beneath the turf the peasant's head, Hither let Luxury lead her loose-rob'd train; ELEGY ON WILLIAM BECKFORD. WEEP on, ye Britons-give your gen'ral tear; But hence, ye venal-hence each titled slave; An honest pang should wait on Beckford's bier, And patriot anguish mark the patriot's grave. When like the Roman to his field retir'd, With soul impell'd by virtue's sacred flame, In the last awful, the departing hour, [grew; When life's poor lamp more faint and fainter As Mem'ry feebly exercis'd her pow'r, He only felt for liberty and you. He view'd Death's arrow with a Christian eye, Thou, breathing Seulpture, celebrate his fame, But murder found no mercy in his sight. He knew, when flatterers besiege a throne, 'Tis not the courtier's interest he should hear. Hence, honest to his prince, his manly tongue, Look'd all around, astonish'd to behold, To royal ears, a mortifying truth. Titles to him no pleasure could impart, For this his name our hist'ry shall adorn, Shall soar on Fame's wide pinions all sublime ; Till heaven's own bright, and never dying morn Absorbs our little particle of time. Chatterton. ELEGY TO PITY. HAIL, lovely power! whose bosom heaves a sigh, When fancy paints the scene of deep distress; Whose tears spontaneous crystallize the eye, When rigid Fate denies the power to bless. Not all the sweets Arabia's gales convey From flowery meads, can with that sigh com pare: Not dewdrops glittering in the morning ray, Seem near so beauteous as that falling tear. Devoid of fear the fawns around thee play; Emblem of peace, the dove before thee flies; No blood-stain'd traces mark thy blameless way, Beneath thy feet no hapless insect dies. Come lovely nymph! and range the mead with me, To spring the partridge from the guileful foe, From secret snares the struggling bird to free, And stop the hand uprais'd to give the blow. And when the air with heat meridian glows, And Nature droops beneath the conquering gleam, Let us, slow wandering where the current flows, Save sinking flies that float along the stream. Or turn to nobler, greater tasks thy care, Teach me to sooth the helpless orphan's grief, And be the sure resource of drooping age. So when the genial spring of life shall fade, Anonymous. |