At thy appearance, Fear itself grows

bold;

Thy fun-fhine melts away his cold.
Encourag'd at the fight of thee,

To the cheek colour comes, and firmness to the knee.

Ev'n Luft, the master of a harden'd face,
Blushes, if thou be'ft in the place,

To Darkness' curtains he retires;

In fympathizing night he rolls his fmoky fires.
When, Goddess! thou lift'ft up thy waken'd head,
Out of the morning's purple bed,

Thy quire of birds about thee play,
And all the joyful world salutes the rifing day.

The ghofts, and monfter-fpirits, that did prefume
A body's privilege to affume,

Vanish again invisibly,

And bodies gain again their visibility.

All the world's bravery, that delights our eyes,
Is but thy feveral liveries;

Thou the rich dye on them bestow'ft,

Thy nimble pencil paints this landscape as thou go'ft.

A crimson garment in the rose thou wear'st;
A crown of studded gold thou bear'st;

The virgin-lilies, in their white,

Are clad but with the lawn of almost naked light.

The violet, Spring's little infant, stands

Girt in thy purple fwadling-bands:

On the fair tulip thou doft doat;

Thou cloath'ft it in a gay and party-colour'd coat.

With flame condens'd thou do'st thy jewels fix,

And folid colours in it mix:

Flora herself envies to fee

Flowers fairer than her own, and durable as the.

Ah, Goddefs! would thou could'st thy hand withold, And be lefs liberal to gold!

Didft thou lefs value to it give,

Of how much care, alas! might'st thou poor man relieve!

To me the fun is more delightful far,

And all fair days much fairer are.

But few, ah! wondrous few, there be,

Who do not gold prefer, O Goddess! ev'n to thee.

Through the foft ways of heaven, and air, and sea,
Which open all their pores to thee,

Like a clear river thou doft glide,

And with thy living stream through the clofe channels flide.

But, where firm bodies thy free course oppose,
Gently thy fource the land o'erflows;

Takes there poffeffion, and does make,

Of colours mingled light, a thick and standing lake.

But the vaft ocean of unbounded day

In th' empyrean heaven does fay.

Thy rivers, lakes, and springs, below,

From thence took first their rise, thither at last must flow.

то

THE ROYAL

SOCIETY.

Hilofophy, the great and only heir

Of all that human knowledge which has been

Unforfeited by man's rebellious fin,

Though full of years he do appear
(Philofophy, I fay, and call it He;
For, whatfoe'er the painter's fancy be,
It a male-virtue feems to me)

Has ftill been kept in nonage till of late,
Nor manag'd or enjoy'd his vaft estate.

Three or four thousand years, one would have thought,
To ripeness and perfection might have brought

A fcience fo well bred and nurft,

And of fuch hopeful parts too at the first :
But, oh! the guardians and the tutors, then
(Some negligent and fome ambitious men)
Would ne'er confent to fet him free,
Or his own natural powers to let him fee,
Left that should put an end to their authority.

That his own bufinefs he might quite forget,
'They' amus'd him with the sports of wanton wit;
With the defferts of poetry they fed him,
Instead of folid meats t' increase his force;
Inftead of vigorous exercise, they led him

Into the pleasant labyrinths of ever-fresh discourse ;

}

Instead of carrying him to fee

The riches which do hoarded for him lie

In Nature's endless treasury,

They chose his eye to entertain

(His curious but not covetous eye)

With painted scenes and pageants of the brain.
Some few exalted spirits this latter age has shown,
That labour'd to affert the liberty

(From guardians who were now ufurpers grown)
Of this old minor ftill, captiv'd Philofophy;
But 'twas rebellion call'd, to fight

For fuch a long-oppreffed right.
Bacon at last, a mighty man, arose,

(Whom a wife king, and nature, chofe, Lord chancellor of both their laws)

And boldly undertook the injur'd pupil's caufe.

Authority-which did a body boast,

Though 'twas but air condens'd, and stalk'd about,

Like fome old giant's more gigantic ghost,

To terrify the learned rout

With the plain magic of true Reason's light

He chac'd out of our fight;

Nor fuffer'd living men to be mifled

By the vain fhadows of the dead :

[tom fled.

To graves, from whence it rofe, the conquer'd phan

He broke that monftrous God which stood
In midst of th' orchard, and the whole did claim;
Which with a ufelefs fcythe of wood,
And fomething else not worth a name

(Both vaft for fhew, yet neither fit

Or to defend, or to beget;

Ridiculous and fenfeless terrors !) made

Children and fuperftitious men afraid.

The orchard 's open now,

and free,

Bacon has broke the fcare-crow deity :

Come, enter, all that will,

Behold the ripen'd fruit, come gather now your

Yet ftill, methinks, we fain would be
Catching at the forbidden tree-

We would be like the Deity

fill!

When truth and falfehood, good and evil, we,
Without the fenfes' aid, within ourselves would see;
For 'tis God only who can find

All Nature in his mind.

}

From words, which are but pictures of the thought
(Though we our thoughts from them perversely drew)
To things, the mind's right object, he it brought:
Like foolish birds, to painted grapes we flew ;
He fought and gather'd for our use the true;
And, when on heaps the chofen bunches lay,
He preft them wifely the mechanic way,
Till all their juice did in one veffel join,
Ferment into a nourishment divine,

The thirty foul's refreshing wine.

Who to the life an exact piece would make,
Muft not from others' work a copy take;

No, not from Rubens or Vandyke;

Much less content himself to make it like

}

Th'