Such was the modest and amiable disposition of Phillis Wheatley. She studied Latin, and her translations show that she made considerable progress in it; and she wrote poetry. At the age of fourteen she appears to have first attempted literary composition, and by the time she was nineteen the whole of her printed poems appear to have been written. They were published in London in 1773 in a small volume of above 120 pages, containing thirty-nine pieces, which she dedicated to the Countess of Huntington. This work has gone through several editions in England and America.
Most of her poetry has a religious or moral bearing; all breathes a soft and sentimental feeling; many pieces were written on the death of friends. In a poem addressed to a clergyman on the death of his wife, some beautiful lines occur:
"O come away," her longing spirit cries,
"And share with me the rapture of the skies.
Our bliss divine to mortals is unknown,
Immortal life and glory are our own.
Here too may the dear pledges of our love
Arrive, and taste with us the joys above;
Attune the harp to more than mortal lays,
And join with us the tribute of their praise