6 Yet conscious of the dangerous charm,
Soon would I turn my steps away;
Nor oft provoke the lovely harm,
Nor lull my reason's watchful sway.
But thou, my friend—I hear thy sighs:
Alas, I read thy downcast eyes;
And thy tongue falters, and thy colour flies.
7 So soon again to meet the fair?
So pensive all this absent hour?—
O yet, unlucky youth, beware,
While yet to think is in thy power.
In vain with friendship's flattering name
Thy passion veils its inward shame;
Friendship, the treacherous fuel of thy flame!
8 Once, I remember, new to Love,
And dreading his tyrannic chain,
I sought a gentle maid to prove
What peaceful joys in friendship reign:
Whence we forsooth might safely stand,
And pitying view the love-sick band,
And mock the wingèd boy's malicious hand.
9 Thus frequent pass'd the cloudless day,
To smiles and sweet discourse resign'd;
While I exulted to survey
One generous woman's real mind:
Till friendship soon my languid breast
Each night with unknown cares possess'd,
Dash'd my coy slumbers, or my dreams distress'd.
10 Fool that I was—And now, even now
While thus I preach the Stoic strain,
Unless I shun Olympia's view,
An hour unsays it all again.
O friend!—when Love directs her eyes
To pierce where every passion lies,
Where is the firm, the cautious, or the wise?
ODE XII.
TO SIR FRANCIS HENRY DRAKE, BARONET.
1 Behold, the Balance in the sky
Swift on the wintry scale inclines:
To earthy caves the Dryads fly,
And the bare pastures Pan resigns.
Late did the farmer's fork o'erspread
With recent soil the twice-mown mead,
Tainting the bloom which Autumn knows:
He whets the rusty coulter now,
He binds his oxen to the plough,
And wide his future harvest throws.
2 Now, London's busy confines round,
By Kensington's imperial towers,
From Highgate's rough descent profound,
Essexian heaths, or Kentish bowers,
Where'er I pass, I see approach
Some rural statesman's eager coach,
Hurried by senatorial cares:
While rural nymphs (alike, within,
Aspiring courtly praise to win)
Debate their dress, reform their airs.
3 Say, what can now the country boast,
O Drake, thy footsteps to detain,
When peevish winds and gloomy frost
The sunshine of the temper stain?
Say, are the priests of Devon grown
Friends to this tolerating throne,
Champions for George's legal right?
Have general freedom, equal law,
Won to the glory of Nassau
Each bold Wessexian squire and knight?