To learning's store, to Galen's science bred,
I saw Orestes rove through all the plain:
His pensive step no friendly genius led
To find one plant that might relieve your pain!
Say, do I wake?—or are your woes a dream!
Depart, dread vision!—waft me far away:
Seek me no more by this sky painted stream
That glides, unconscious, to the Indian bay.
Alcander!—ah!—what tears for thee must flow—
What doom awaits the wretch that tortured thee!
May never flower in his cursed garden blow,
May never fruit enrich his hated tree:
May that fine spark, which Nature lent to man,
Reason, be thou extinguished in his brain;
Sudden his doom, contracted be his span,
Ne'er to exist, or spring from dust again.
May no kind genius save his step from harms:
Where'er he sails, may tempests rend the sea;
May never maiden yield to him her charms,
Nor prattling infant hang upon his knee!
Retire, retire, forget the inhuman shore:
Dark is the sun, when woes like these dismay;
Resign your groves, and view with joy no more
The fragrant orange, and the floweret gay."
[373] First published in the 1795 edition. Text from the edition of 1809.
A NEWSMAN'S ADDRESS[374]
Though past events are hourly read,
The various labours of the dead,
In vain their story we recall,
The rise of empires, or the fall;
Our modern men, a busy crew,
Must, in their turn, have something new.
By moralists we have been told
That "Time himself in time grows old;
"The seasons change, the moons decay,
"The sun shines weaker every day,
"Justice is from the world withdrawn,
"Virtue and friendship almost gone,
"Religion fails (the clergy shew)
"And man, alas, must vanish too."
Let others such opinions hold,
(Since grumbling has been always old;)
All Nature must decay, 'tis true,
But Nature shall her face renew,
Her travels in a circle make,
Freeze but to thaw, sleep but to wake.
Die but to live, and live to die,
In summer smile, in autumn sigh,
Resume the garb that once she wore,
Repeat the words she said before,
Bow down with age, or, fresh and gay,
Change, only to prevent decay.
As up and down, with weary feet,
I travel each fatiguing street,
Meeting the frowns of party men,
Foes to the freedom of the pen,
And to your doors our sheets convey—
I sometimes think I hear you say,
"Ah, were it not for what he brings,
(This messenger of many things)
We should be in a sorry plight;
The wars of Europe out of sight,
No paragraphs of home affairs
To tell us how the fabric wears
Which Freedom built on Virtue's plan,
And Virtue only can maintain."
But something further you pretend,—
From want of money, heaven defend!
Leave that to those who sleep in sheds,
Or on the pavement make their beds,
Who clean the streets, or carry news,
Repair old coats, or cobble shoes—
Of every ill with which we're curs'd
This want of money is the worst:
This was the curse that fell on Cain,
The vengeance for a brother slain:
For this he quit his native sod,
Retreated to the land of Nod,
And, in the torture of despair,
Turn'd poet, pimp, or newsman there—
Divines have labour'd in the dark
To find the meaning of his mark:
How many idle things they wrote—
'Twas nothing but a ragged coat.
Should money, now, be scarce with you,
With me, alas, 'tis nothing new!
We news-men always are in need,
(So Beer and Bacchus have decreed)
And still your bounty shall implore
Till—printing presses are no more!—
Did we not conjure up our strain
The year might come and go again,
Seasons advance, and moons decay,
And life itself make haste away,
And news-men only vex their brains
To have their labour for their pains—
Such usage I may find, 'tis true,
But then it would be—something new!