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ARGUMENT.

THE separation of the works of the imagi

nation from philosophy, the cause of their abuse among the moderns.--Prospect of their reunion under the influence of public liberty. Enumeration of accidental pleasures, which increase the effect of objects delightful to the imagination.The pleasures of sense. Particular circumstances of the mind. Discovery of truths. Perception of contrivance and design. Emotion of the passions. All the natural passions partake of a pleasing sensation, with the final cause of this constitution illustrated by an allegorical vision and exemplified in sorrow, pity, terror, and indig

nation.

BOOK II.

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HEN shall the laurel and the vocal string
Resume their honours? When shall we behold
The tuneful tongue, the Promethean hand
Aspire to ancient praise? Alas! how faint,
How slow the dawn of beauty and of truth
Breaks the reluctant shades of Gothic night
Which yet involve the nations! Long they groan'd
Beneath the furies of rapacious force;

Oft as the gloomy north, with iron swarms
Tempestuous pouring from her frozen caves,
Blasted the Italian shore, and swept the works
Of liberty and wisdom down the gulph
Of all devouring night. As long immur'd
In noon-tide darkness, by the glimm'ring lamp
Each muse and each fair science pin'd away
The sordid hours; while foul, barbarian hands
Their mysteries profan'd, unstrung the lyre,
And chain'd the soaring pinion down to earth.
At last the muses rose and spurn'd their bonds,
And wildly warbling, scatter'd, as they flew,
Their blooming wreaths from fair Valclusa's bowers
To Arno's myrtle border and the shore
Of soft Parthenope. But still the rage

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Of dire ambition, and gigantic power,

From public aims, and from the busy walk
Of civil commerce, drove the bolder train
Of penetrating science, to the cells,

Where studious ease consumes the silent hour
In shadowy searches and unfruitful care.

Thus from their guardians torn, the tender arts
Of mimic fancy and harmonious joy,
To priestly domination and the lust
Of lawless courts, their amiable toil
For three inglorious ages have resign'd,
In vain reluctant; and Torquato's tongue
Was turn'd for slavish peans at the throne
Of tinsel pomp; and Raphael's magic hand
Effus'd its fair creation to enchant
The fond adoring herd in Latian fanes

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To blind belief; while on their prostrate necks

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The sable tyrant plants his heel secure.

But now behold! the radiant æra dawns,

When freedom's ample fabric, fix'd at length
For endless years on Albion's happy shore
In full proportion, once more shall extend
To all the kindred powers of social bliss
A common mansion, a parental roof.

There shall the virtues, there shall wisdom's train,
Their long lost friends rejoining, as of old,

Embrace the smiling family of arts,

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The muses and the graces. Then no more

Shall vice distracting their delicious gifts

To aims abhorr'd with high distaste and scorn

Turn from their charm the philosophic eye,

The patriot bosom: then no more the paths
Of public care or intellectual toil,

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Alone by footsteps haughty and severe,

The gloomy state he trod; the harmonious muse

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And her persuasive sisters then shall plant
Their sheltering laurels o'er the bleak ascent,
And shed their flowers along the rugged way.
"Arm'd with the lyre, already have we dar'd,'
To pierce divine philosophy's retreats
And teach the muse her lore; already strove
Their long divided honours to unite,
While tempering this deep argument we sang
Of truth and beauty. Now the same fair task
Impends; now urging our ambitious toil,
We hasten to recount the various springs

Of adventitious pleasure, which adjoin
Their grateful influence to the prime effect
Of objects grand or beauteous, and inlarge
The complicated joy. The sweets of sense,
Do they not oft with kind accession flow,
To raise harmonious fancy's native charm?
So while we taste the fragrance of the rose,
Glows not her blush the fairer? While we view
Amid the noontide walk a limpid rill

Gush thro' the trickling herbage, to the thirst
Of summer yielding the delicious draught
Of cool refreshment; o'er the mossy brink
Shines not the surface clearer, and the waves
With sweeter music murmur as they flow?

Nor this alone; the various lot of life Oft from external circumstance assumes A moment's disposition to rejoice

In those delights which at a different hour

Would pass unheeded. Fair the face of spring,
When rural songs and odours wake the morn,
To every eye; but how much more to his,
Round whom the bed of sickness long diffus'd
Its melancholy gloom! how doubly fair,
When first with fresh-born vigor he inhales
The balmy breeze, and feels the blessed sun
Warm at his bosom, from the springs of life
Chasing oppressive damps and languid pain!

Or shall I mention, where celestial truth
Her awful light discloses, to effulge

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A more majestic pomp on beauty's frame?

For man loves knowledge, and the beams of truth

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More welcome touch his understanding eye,

Than all the blandishments of sound, his ear,

Than all of taste his tongue. Nor ever yet
The melting rainbow's vernal tinctur'd hues
To me have shone so pleasing, as when first
The hand of science pointed out the path

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In which the sun-beams gleaming from the west

Fall on the watry cloud, whose darksome veil
Involves the orient; and that trickling show'r
Piercing thro' every crystaline convex
Of clust❜ring dew-drops to their flight oppos'd,
Recoil at length where concave all behind
The internal surface of each glassy orb

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