And easy on a native throne Of humble turf, sits gently down, Yet should tumultuous storms arise, Still she's at peace; for well she knows Nor breathe a climate half so kind. TO JOHN HARTOPP, ESQ. (AFTERWARDS SIR JOHN HARTOPP, BART.) Vive joeundæ metuens juventæ, &c. July, 1700. LIVE, my dear Hartopp, live to-day, Shake off your ease, and send your name To immortality and fame, By every hour that flies. Youth's a soft scene, but trust her not: Her airy minutes, swift as thought, } Slide off the slippery sphere; Moons, with their months, make hasty rounds, The sun has pass'd his vernal bounds, And whirls about the year. Let folly dress in green and red, Hartopp, mark the withering rose, Bright and lasting bliss below Is all romance and dream; Only the joys celestial flow The pleasures that the smiling day Airy chance, and iron fate, The harness'd hours and minutes strive, Not half so fast the galley flies O'er the Venetian sea, When sails, and oars, and labouring skies, Contend to make her way. Swift wings for all the flying hours The God of time prepares; The rest lie still yet in their nest, TO THE SAME. THE DISDAIN. 1700. HARTOPP, I love the soul that dares Young Hartopp knows this noble theme, The noise, the' amusements, and the strife, Flesh is the vilest and the least Ingredient of our frame: We're born to live above the beast, Pleasures of sense we leave for boys: TO THOMAS GUNSTON, ESQ. 1703. HAPPY SOLITUDE. CASIMER, BOOK IV. ODE 12. IMITATED. Quid me latentem, &c. THE noisy world complains of me, Gunston, the lark dwells in her nest And in my closet I could rest Yet they will urge, 'This private life To' engage you for a guest.' Friend, should the towers of Windsor or Whitehall To make my entertainment gay; But short should be my stay: Since a diviner service waits [day. To' employ my hours at home, and better fill the When I within myself retreat, I shut my doors against the great; And view the various scenes of my retiring soul; While hope and fear are in a doubtful strife, Be acted well to gain the plaudit of my God. There's a day hastening, ('tis an awful day!) When the great Sovereign shall at large review All that we speak, and all we do, The several parts we act on this wide stage of clay: These he approves, and those he blames, And crowns perhaps a porter, and a prince he O! if the Judge from his tremendous seat [damns. Shall not condemn what I have done, I shall be happy though unknown; Nor heed the gazing rabble, nor the shouting street. I hate the glory, friend, that springs Till Envy shoots, and Fame receives the wound; Down glory falls, and strikes the ground, Rather let me be quite conceal'd from fame; How happy I should lie In sweet obscurity, Nor the loud world pronounce my little name! |