Sate sullen at the gloomy grate;
Now could, alas! sustain no more
Of constancy the modest power
Against th' assaults of ridicule;
Here first, by sour impatience cross'd,
Ver-Vert his innocency lost.
From thence he pour'd ungrateful curses
Against the nuns his former nurses,
Who never had adorn'd his mind,
Careless of literary merit,
With language copious and refin'd,
Replete with elegance and spirit.
T' acquire this great accomplishment
Each earnest faculty he bent,
And though his prudent tongue lay still,
His soul of thinking had its fill.
But first the bird resolv'd, in pet,
All the old gew-gaws to forget
Which hitherto compos'd his creed,
That new ideas might succeed.
In two days by strict computation,
All former knowledge he expell'd;
So much the present conversation
The convent dialect excell'd.
This first step made, within a trice,
The truly docile animal
(Young minds too soon are skill'd in vice!) In ribaldry was clerical,
And quickly learn'd to curse and swear,
As fast as an old devil would chatter,
Bound down by chains of mystic prayer,
Beneath a pot of holy water.
His practice contradicted plain
A maxim which old books maintain,
That none to heinous crimes can leap
At first, but progress step by step;
For he at once without degree
Was doctor in iniquity.
He learnt by heart the alphabet
Of watermen, the Loire along,
And when, in any stormy fit,
An oath escap'd a sailor's tongue;
Ver-Vert, emphatically plain,
Re-echo'd "Damn you" back again.
On this, applauded by the crew,
Proudly content with what had past,
Solicitous he daily grew,
The shameful honour to pursue
Of pleasing their corrupted taste;
And, soon degrading to their bent,
His generous organ of discourse,
Became profanely eloquent.
Ah! why should be d examples force
A youthful heart, born free from evils,
From Heaven's allegiance to the Devil's?
Ye nymphs of Nevers' convent chaste,
What did you in your cloister'd cells,
Where pensive Melancholy dwells,
Whilst these unlucky moments pass'd?
In that sad interval, no doubt,
Nine days you spent in prayers devout,
Petitioning kind Heaven to give
A happy journey home again
To the most thankless soul alive,
Who, quite regardless of your pain,
Abroad engag'd in pleasures new,
Spent not a single thought on you.
The yawning band of Tediousness
The convent round besieg'd each gate;
And Spleen, in fanciful distress,
Nay, what the sex shuns every where,
Silence herself came almost there.
Ah! cease your vows, for Ver-Vert's grown
Unworthy of your lavish loves;
Ver-Vert no longer will be known
By heart as spotless as the dove's,
By temper softer than the down,
By fervency of soul in prayer;
Oh! must the Muse the truth declare?
A very wretched profligate,
A scoffer of his ancient home,
Blasphemer of your holy state,
And loose apostate he's become;
What you such care and labour cost,
Among the winds and waves is lost.
Then, fair-ones, fondly boast no more
His science and his docile soul,
Genius is vain, and learning's store,
If virtue governs not the whole.
Forget him quite; the shameful wretch
His heart has tainted with pollution,
And given up all those powers of speech
And mighty parts to prostitution.
But now to Nants, the boat's last station,
Our hero and his friends draw nigh,
Where through impatient expectation
The holy sisters almost die:
For their desires the rising Sun
Begins his daily course too late;
Too slow his fiery coursers run,
To gain at eve the western gate.
The flatterer Hope, in this suspense,
For ever artful to deceive,
Promis'd a prodigy to give
Of genius, dignity, and sense;
A parrot highly-born and bred,
Possess'd of noble sentiments,
Persuasive tongue, discerning head;
In short with all accomplishments:
But O! I mention it with pain,
These expectations all were vain!
At length the vessel reaches land,
Where an old solemn sister sate,
Commission'd by the sacred band
Th' arrival of the bird to wait;
Who, on that errand daily sent,
Ere since the first epistle went,
At first approach of rising day
Her wandering eyes impatient cast,
Which seem'd, along the watery waste,
To waft our hero on his way.
The sly bird had no sooner seen
The nun, near whom he disembark'd,
But straight he knew her by the mien
And eyes with holy prudery mark'd,
By the white gloves and languid tone,
The veil, and linsey-woolsey vest,
And, what would have suffic'd alone,
The little cross upon her breast.
He shudder'd at th' approaching evil,
And, soldier-like, we may conclude,
Sincerely wish'd her at the devil;
Preferring much the brotherhood
Of the dragoons who spoke out plain,
Whose dialect he understood,
Than to return to learn again
Prayers stuff'd with many a holy notion,
And ceremonials of devotion:.
But the vex'd droll, by force, was fated
To be conducted where he hated.
The careful carrier held her prize
In spite of all his rueful cries;
Though much he bit her, by the way,
Upon her arms, her neck, and face,
And in his anger, as they say,
Would not have scrupled any place.
At last howe'er, with much ado,
She brought him safe to sacred ground;
Ver-Vert's announc'd: the rumour flew
Swift as the wind the convent round.
The bell proclaims the welcome morn;
Straight from the choir each sister springs,
And to the common parlour's borne
On expectation's eager wings.
All crowd this wonder to behold
With longings truly female fir'd;
Nay, e'en the feeble and the old
With youth's warm thoughts are re-inspir'd;
Whilst each, regardless of her years,
For speed forgets the load she bears;
And mother Agnes, near fourscore,
Now runs, who never ran before.
'AT length expos'd to public view,
His figure was by all admir'd;
Charm'd with a sight so fair and new,
Their eager eyes were never tir'd;
Their taste beyond dispute was true;
For though the rogue had swerv'd from duty,
He had not lost one jot of beauty,
And the camp mien and rakish stare
Improv'd it with an easy air.
Why, Heaven, should charms attractive glow,
Brilliant around a son of sin?
Rather deformity should show
The badness of the heart within.
To praise his looks and lovely feather
Our sisters babbled so together,
Unheard, it would have been no wonder,
If Heaven had roll'd its loudest thunder:
Mean while unmov'd th' apostate bird
Deign'd not to speak one pious word,
But, like a lusty Carmelite,
Roll'd his lascivious eyes about.
This gave offence: so lewd a sight
Was shocking to the band devout.
Next, when the mother abbess came,
With an authoritative look,
The feather'd libertine to blame,
Contemptuously his tail he shook;
And, not maturely having weigh'd
The horrour of the words he said,
Reply'd, in military phrase,
"What damn'd fools nuns are now-a-days!"
Our history notes, that on the way
These words he'd heard the sailors say.
At this, with looks demure, another,
The holy sisterhood among,
(Willing to make him hold his tongue),
Cry'd, "Fie! for shame, my dearest brother!" For thanks this dearest brother swore,
And us'd, sagaciously enough,
One syllable that rhimes to more,
'Gainst which few female ears are proof.
"Jesu! good mother," she exclaim'd,
"This is some wicked witch, 'tis clear;
And not the bird of Nevers fam'd,
To friends of our religion dear!"
Here, sutler-like, he cry'd aloud,
"The devil seize this noisy crowd!"
By turns each sister did essay
To curb the feather'd grenadier;
And each as fast was sent away
With something buzzing in her ear;
For, laughing at the younger tribe,
He mimick'd their loquacious rage;
And, still more freely to describe
The dull grimace of scolding age,
He ridicul'd the dying closes
Of precepts snuffled through their noses.
But, what was worse than all the rest,
By these dull sermons much oppress'd,
And with unvented choler swelling,
He thunder'd out each horrid word,
The very tars in noise excelling,
Which on the river he had heard;
Cursing and swearing all along,
Invoking every power of Hell,
Whilst b's redundant from his tongue,
And f's emphatically fell.
The sense of what they heard him speak
The younger sisters could not tell;
For they believ'd his language Greek:
Next he came out with "blood! and zounds!
Damnation,-brimstone,-fire,-and thunder!"
The grate, at these terrific sounds
Trembling, is almost split asunder;
And the good nuns in speechless fright,
Crossing their throbbing bosoms, fly
Each to her cell remote from light,
Thinking the day of judgment nigh.
Wide opening her sepulchral jaws,
One ancient sister whines, "What evil
Have we designed, good Heaven, that draws
Upon us this incarnate devil?
By what incentive is he mov'd
So like the damn'd below to swear?
Is this that Ver-Vert so approv'd?
Are these his faculties so rare?
But let us without farther pain
Send back the profligate again."
"Mother of God!" another cries,
"What horrours are before our eyes!
In Nevers' consecrated dome
Is this the language vestals speak?
Is all their youth taught thus at home?
Home with the hateful heretic!
For, if he enters, we shall dwell
In league with all the fiends of Hell."
In fine, his freedom Ver-Vert lost;
And 'twas resolv'd, without delay,
To send the wretch cag'd-up away.
This end our pilgrim wish'd the most:
Howe'er, in form, he 's cited first,
Arraign'd, detestable declar'd,
Convicted by the court, accurst,
And from each charity debarr'd,
For having wickedly assail'd
The virtue of the sister's veil'd.
All sign the sentence, yet bemoan
The object it's inflicted on;
For pity 'tis, ere full-age blooms,
To find depravity so foul,
Or that, beneath such beauteous plumes,
A debauchée's corrupted soul,
The pagan manners of a Turk,
And tongue of infidel, should lurk.
In short his old conductress bore
The banished culprit to the port;
But in returning, as before,
He never bit our sister for 't;
For joyfully he left the shore,
And in a tilt-boat home return'd,
Where Nevers' nuns his absence mourn'd.
Such was the Iliad of his woes!
But, ah! what unexpected mourning,
What clamour and despair arose,
When, to his for.ner friends returning,
He shock'd them with a repetition
Of his late verbal acquisition!
What could th' afflicted sisters do?
With eyes in tears, and hearts in trouble,
Nine venerable nuns, for woe
Each in a veil funereal double,
Into the seat of judgment go,
Who, in their wrinkled fronts, resembled
Nine Ages in a court assembled.
There without hopes of happy ending,
Depriv'd of all to plead his cause
On whom there was the least depending,
Poor Ver-Vert sate, unskill'd in laws,
Chain'd to his cage, in open court,
And stripp'd of glory and support.
To condemnation they proceed:
Two Sibyls sentence him to bleed;
'Twas voted by two sisters more,
Not so religiously inhuman,
To send him to that Indian shore,
Unknown to any Christian woman,
That conscience might his bosom gore,
And yield him up a prey to death,
Where first, with Brachmen, he drew breath.
But the five others all according
In lesser punishments awarding,
For penance, two long months conclude
That he should pass in abstinence,
Three more in dismal solitude,
And four in speechless penitence;
During which season they preclude
Biscuits and fruits, the toilette's treasures,
Alcoves and walks, those convent-pleasures.
Nor was this all; for, to complete
His miserable situation,
They gave him, in his sad retreat,
For gaoler, guard, and conversation,
A stale lay-sister, or much rather
An old veil'd ape, all skin and bone,
Or, cover'd o'er with wrinkled leather,
A walking female skeleton,
An object proper to fall'n glory,
To cry aloud, memento mori.
Spite of this dragon's watchful soul,
The younger nuns would often go,
With looks of pity to condole;
Which e'en in exile soften'd woe.
Nay some, from morning prayers returning,
With nuts and candied almonds came;
But to a wretch in prison mourning
Weeds and ambrosia were the same.
Taught by misfortune's sound tuition,
Cloth'd with disgrace, and stung with pain,
Or sick of that old scare-crow vision,
The bird became in pure contrition
Acquainted with himself again:
Forgetting his belov'd dragoons,
And quite according with the nuns
In one continued unison
Of air, of manners, and of tone;
No sleek prebendal priest could be
More thoroughly devout than he.
When this conversion was related,
The grey divan at once awarded
His banishment should be abated,
And farther vengeance quite discarded.
There the blest day of his recall
Is annually a festival,
Whose silken moments, white and even,
Spun by the hands of smiling Love,
Whilst all th' attendant Fates approve,
To soft delights are ever given.
How short's the date of human pleasure! How false of happiness the measure!
The dormitory, strew'd with flowers,
Short prayer, rejoicing, song, and feast,
Sweet tumult, freedom, thoughtless hours,
Their amiable zeal express'd,
And not a single sign of sorrow
The woes predicted of to morrow.
But, O! what favours misapplied
Our holy sisterhood bestow'd!
From abstinence's shallow tide
Into a stream that overflow'd
With sweets, so long debarr'd from tasting,
Poor Ver-Vert too abruptly hasting
(His skin with sugar being wadded,
With liquid fires his entrails burn'd,)
Beheld at once his roses faded,
And to funereal cypress turn'd.
The nuns endeavour'd, but in vain,
His fleeting spirit to detain;
But sweet excess had hasten'd fate;
And, whilst around the fair-ones cry'd,
Of love a victim fortunate
In pleasure's downy breast he died.
His dying words their bosoms fir'd,
And will for ever be admir'd.
Venus herself his eye-lids clos'd,
And in Elysium plac'd his shade,
Where hero parrots safe repos'd
In almond-groves that never fade,
Near him, whose fate and fluent tongue,
Corinna's lover wept and sung.
What tongue sufficiently can tell
How much bemoan'd our hero fell!
The nun, whose office 'twas, invited
The bearers to the illustrious dead;
And letters circular indited,
In which this mournful tale I read.
But, to transmit his image down
To generations yet unknown,
A painter, who each beauty knew,
His portraiture from nature drew;
And many a hand, guided by Love,
O'er the stretch'd sampler's canvass plain,
In broidery's various colours strove
To raise his form to life again;
Whilst Grief, t' assist each artist, came
And painted tears around the frame.
All rites funereal they bestow'd,
Which erst to birds of high renown
The band of Helicon allow'd,
When from the body life was flown.
Beneath a verdant myrtle's shade,
Which o'er the mausoleum spread,
A small sarcophagus was laid,
To keep the ashes of the dead.
On porphyry grav'd in characters
Of gold, with sculptur'd garlands grac'd,
These lines, exciting Pity's tears,
Our convent Artemisias plac'd,
"Ye novice nuns, who to this grove repair,
To chat by stealth, unaw'd by Age's frown;
Your tongues one moment, if you can, forbear,
Till the sad tale of our affliction's known.
If' tis too much that organ to restrain,
Use it to speak what anguish death imparts:
One line this cause for sorrow will explain; Here Ver-Vert lies; and here lie all our hearts."
'Tis said however (to pursue
My story but a word or two)
The soul of Ver-Vert is not pent
Within th' aforesaid monument,
But, by permission of the Fates,
Some holy sister animates;
And wll, in transmigration, run
From time to time, from nun to nun,
Transmitting to all ages hence
In them his deathless eloquence.
THE ESTIMATE of life,
IN THREE PARTS.
PART I.
MELPOMENE; OR, THE MELANCHOLY.
If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing,
That none but fools would weep.
Shaksp. Meas. for Meas.
OFFSPRING of folly and of noise,
Fantastic train of airy joys,
Cease, cease your vain delusive lore,
And tempt my serious thoughts no more,
Ye horrid forms, ye gloomy throng,
Who hear the bird of midnight's song,
Thou too, Despair, pale spectre, come,
From the self-murd'rer's haunted tomb,
While sad Melpomene relates,
How we're afflicted by the fates.
What's all this wish'd-for empire, life?
A scene of mis'ry, care, and strife;
And make the most, that 's all we have
Betwixt the cradle and the grave.
The being is not worth the charge:
Behold the estimate at large.
Our youth is silly, idle, vain;
Our age is full of care and pain;
From wealth accrues anxiety;
Contempt and want from poverty;
What trouble business has in store!
How idleness fatigues us more;
To reason, th' ignorant are blind;
The learned's eyes are too refin'd;
Each wit deems every wit his foe,
Each fool is naturally so;
And every rank and every station
Meet justly with disapprobation.
Say, man, is this the boasted state,
Where all is pleasant, all is great?
Alas! another face you'll see,
Take off the veil of vanity.
Is aught in pleasure, aught in pow'r,
Has wisdom any gift in store,
To make thee stay a single hour?
Tell me, ye youthful, who approve
Th' intoxicating sweets of love,
What endless nameless throbs arise,
What heart-felt anguish and what sighs,
When jealousy has gnaw'd the root,
Whence love's united branches shoot?
Or grant that Hymen lights his torch,
To lead you to the nuptial porch,
Behold! the long'd-for rapture o'er!
Desire begins to lose its pow'r,
Then cold indifference takes place,
Fruition alters quite the case;
And what before was ecstasy,
Is scarcely now civility.
Your children bring a second care;
If childless then you want an heir;
So that in both alike you find
The same perplexity of mind.
Do pow'r or wealth more comfort own?
Behold yon pageant on a throne,
Where silken swarms of flattery
Obsequious wait his asking eye.
But view within his tortur'd breast,
No more the downy seat of rest,
Suspicion casts her poison'd dart,
And guilt, that scorpion, stings his heart.
Will knowledge give us happiness?
In that, alas! we know there's less,
For every pang of mental woe
Springs from the faculty to know.
Hark! at the death-betok'ning knell
Of yonder doleful passing-bell,
Perhaps a friend, a father's dead,
Or the lov'd partner of thy bed!
Perhaps thy only son lies there,
Breathless upon the sable bier!
Say, what can ease the present grief,
Can former joys afford relief?
Those former joys remember'd still,
The more augment the recent ill,
And where you seek for comfort, gain
Additional increase of pain.
What woes from mortal ills accrue!
And what from natural ensue!
Disease and casualty attend
Our footsteps to the journey's end;
The cold catarrh, the gout and stone,
The dropsy, jaundice, jom'd in one,
The raging fever's inward heat,
The pale consumption's fatal sweat,
And thousand more distempers roam,
To drag us to th' eternal home.
And when solution sets us free
From prison of mortality,
The soul dilated joins in air,
alas! we know not where.
And the poor body will become
A clod within a lonely tomb.
Reflection sad! such bodies must
Return, and mingle with the dust!
But neither sense nor beauty bave
Defensive charms against the grave,
Nor virtue's shield, nor wisdom's lore,
Nor true religion's sacred pow'r;
For as that charnel's earth you see,
E'en, my Eudocia, you will be.
Care puts an easier aspect on,
CALLIOPE; OR, THE CHEERFUL.
Inter cuncta leges, et percunctabere doctos,
Qua ratione queas traducere leniter ævum.
Hor. lib. i. ep. 18.
GRIM Superstition, hence away
To native night, and leave the day,
Nor let thy hellish brood appear,
Begot on Ignorance and Fear.
Come, gentle Mirth, and Gaiety,
Sweet daughter of Society;
Whilst fair Calliope pursues
Flights worthy of the cheerful Muse,
O life, thou great essential good,
Where every blessing's understood!
Where Plenty, Freedom, Pleasure meet,
To make cach fleeting moment sweet;
Where moral Love and Innocence,
The balm of sweet Content dispense;
Where Peace expands her turtle wings,
And Hope a constant requiem sings;
With easy thought my breast inspire,
To thee I tune the sprightly lyre.
From Heav'n this emanation flows,
To Heav'n again the wand'rer goes:
And whilst employ'd beneath on Earth,
Its boon attendants, Ease and Mirth,
Join'd with the social Virtues three,
And their calm parent Charity,
Conduct it to the sacred plains
Where happiness terrestrial reigns.
'Tis Discontent alone destroys
The harvest of our ripening joys;
Resolve to be exempt from woe,
Your resolution keeps you so.
Whate'er is needful man receives,
Nay more superfluous Nature gives,
Indulgent parent, source of bliss,
Profuse of goodness to excess!
For thee 'tis, man, the Zephyr blows,
For thee the purple vintage flows,
Each flow'r its various hue displays,
The lark exalts her vernal lays,
To view yon azure vault is thine,
And my Eudocia's form divine.
Hark! how the renovating Spring
Invites the feather'd choir to sing,
Spontaneous mirth and rapture glow
On every shrub, and every bough;
Their little airs a lesson give,
They teach us mortals how to live,
And well advise us, whilst we can,
To spend in joy the vital span.
Ye gay and youthful, all advance
Together knit in festive dance,
See blooming Hebe leads the way,
For youth is Nature's holiday.
If dire Misfortune should employ
Her dart to wound the timely joy,
Solicit Bacchus with your pray'r,
No earthly goblin dares come near,
Pale Anger smooths her threat'ning frown,
Mirth comes in Melancholy's stead,
And Discontent conceals her head.
The thoughts on vagrant pinions fly,
And mount exulting to the sky;
Thence with enraptur'd views look down
On golden empires all their own.
Or let, when Fancy spreads her sails,
Love waft you on with easier gales,
Where in the soul-bewitching groves,
Euphrosyne, sweet goddess, roves;
'Tis rapture all, 'tis ecstacy!
An earthly immortality!
This all the ancient bards employ'd,
'Twas all the ancient gods enjoy'd,
Who often from the realms above
Came down on Earth t' indulge in love,
Still there's one greater bliss in store,
'Tis virtuous Friendship's social hour,
When goodness from the heart sincere
Pours forth Compassion's balmy tear,.
For from those tears such transports flow,
As none but friends and angels know.
Bless'd state! where every thing conspires
To fill the breast with heav'nly fires!
Where for a while the soul must roam,
To preconceive the state to come,
And when through life the journey's past,
Without repining or distaste,
Again the spirit will repair,
To breathe a more celestial air,
And reap, where blessed beings glow,
Completion of the joys below.
TERPSICHORE; OR, THE MODERATE.
- διδε δ' αγαθον τε κακον σε
Hæc satis est orare Jovem, qui donat et aufert; Det vitam, det opes; æquum mi animum ipse parabo.
DESCEND, Astræa, from above,
Where Jove's celestial daughters rove,
And deign once more to bring with thee
Thy earth-deserting family,
Calm Temperance, and Patience mild,
Sweet Contemplation's heavenly child,
Reflection firm, and Fancy free,
Religion pure, and Probity,
Whilst all the Heliconian throng
Shall join Terpsichore in song.
Ere man, great Reason's lord, was made,
Or the world's first foundations laid,
As high in their divine abodes,
Consulting sat the mighty gods,
Jove on the chaos looking down,
Spoke thus from his imperial throne:
"Ye deities and potentates,
Aerial pow'rs, and heav'nly states,
Lo, in that gloomy place below,
Where darkness reigns and discord now,
There a new world shall grace the skies,
And a new creature form'd arise,
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