Yet cannot wisdom ftamp our joys complete;
'Tis confcious virtue crowns the bleft retreat.
Who feels not that, the private path must shun;
And fly to public view t' escape his own;
In life's gay scenes uneafy thoughts suppress,
And lull each anxious care in dreams of peace.
'Midft foreign objects not employ'd to roam,
Thought, fadly active, ftill corrodes at home:
A ferious moment breaks the false repose,
And guilt in all its naked horror shows.
He who would know retirement's joy refin'd,
The fair recefs muft feek with cheerful mind:
No Cynic's pride, no bigot's heated brain,
No fruftrate hope, nor love's fantastic pain,
With him must enter the fequefter'd cell,
Who means with pleasing folitude to dwell;
But equal paffions let his bofom rule,
A judgment candid, and a temper cool,
Enlarg'd with knowledge, and in confcience clear,
Above life's empty hopes, and death's vain fear.
Such he must be who greatly lives alone;
Such Portio is, in crowded scenes unknown.
For public life with every talent born,
Portio far off retires with decent fcorn;
Though without bufinefs, never unemploy'd,
And life, as more at leifure, more enjoy'd :
For who like him can various fcience taste,
His mind fhall never want an endless feaft,
In his bleft ev'ning walk may'ft thou, may I,
Oft friendly join in fweet fociety;
Our lives like his in one fmooth current flow,
Nor fwell'd with tempeft, nor too calmly flow,
Whilft he, like fome great fage of Rome or Greece,
Shall calm each rifing doubt, and speak us peace,
Correct each thought, each wayward wish controul,
And stamp with every virtue all the foul.
Ah! how unlike is Umbrio's gloomy fcene,
Eftrang'd from all the cheerful ways of men!
There fuperftition works her baneful pow'r,
And darkens all the melancholy hour.
Unnumber'd fears corrode and haunt his breast,
With all that whim or ign'rance can suggest.
In vain for him kind nature pours her sweets;
The vifionary faint no joy admits,
But feeks with pious spleen fantastic woes,
And for heav'n's fake heav'n's offer'd good foregoes.
Whate'er's our choice we ftill with pride prefer,
And all who deviate, vainly think must err :
Clodio, in books and abstract notions loft,
Sees none but knaves and fools in honor's poft ;
Whilft Syphax, fond on fortune's fea to fail,
And boldly drive before the flatt'ring gale,
(Forward her dang'rous ocean to explore,)
Condemns as cowards those who make the shore.
Not fo my friend impartial,-man he views
Useful in what he fhuns as what pursues ;
Sees different turns to general good confpire,
The hero's paffion and the poet's fire;
Each figure plac'd in nature's wife defign,
With true proportion and exactest line :
Sees lights and shades unite in due degree,
And form the whole with faireft fymmetry.
Near CAERMARTHEN, South Wales.
ILENT nymph, with curious eye!
Who, the purple ev'ning, lie
On the mountain's lonely van,
Beyond the noise of bufy man,
Painting fair the form of things,
While the yellow linnet fings;
* Mr. John Dyer was the fecond fon of Robert Dyer of Aberglasney, in Caermarthenshire, a folicitor of great capacity and note. He was born in the year 1700, and received his education at Weftminsterschool, from whence he returned home, being defigned for his father's profeffion. Difliking the ftudy of the law, he relinquished it on the death of his parent, and having an inclination for painting, became
Or the tuneful nightingale
Charms the foreft with her tale;
Come with all thy various hues,
Come, and aid thy fifter Mufe;
Now while Phoebus riding high
Gives luftre to the land and fky!
Grongar Hill invites my fong,
Draw the landskip bright and strong;
Grongar, in whofe moffy cells.
Sweetly mufing Quiet dwells;
Grongar, in whose filent shade,
For the modest Muses made,
So oft I have, the evening ftill,
At the fountain of a rill,
Sate upon a flow'ry bed,
With my hand beneath my head;
pupil to Mr. Richardfon. He then travelled into Italy, continued fome time at Rome, and came back to England in 1740. His proficiency as an artist seems to have been but inconfiderable; and this circumftance, joined to an ill state of health, and the love of study, determined him to the church. He therefore entered into holy orders, and in 1741 ob, tained the living of Calthorp, in Leicestershire, on which he lived ten years, and then exchanged it for Belchford, in Lincolnshire. In 1752 he was prefented to the rectory of Coningsby, and foon after had that of Kirkby given him in addition. On the two latter he remained during the rest of his life, which ended in July 1758, of a confumptive disorder, which he had fruggled with many years.
While ftray'd my eyes o'er Towy's flood,
Over mead, and over wood,
From houfe to houfe, from hill to hill,
'Till Contemplation had her fill.
About his chequer'd fides I wind,
And leave his brooks and meads behind,
And groves and grottoes where I lay,
And viftoes fhooting beams of day:
Wide and wider spreads the vale ;
As circles on a smooth canal ;
The mountains round, unhappy fate!
Sooner or later, all of height,
Withdraw their fummits from the skies,
And leffen as the others rife ;
Still the profpect wider fpreads,
Adds a thousand woods and meads,
Still it widens, widens ftill,
And finks the newly-rifen hill.
Now, I gain the mountain's brow,
What a landskip lies below!
No clouds, no vapours intervene,
But the gay, the open fcene
Does the face of nature fhow,
In all the hues of heaven's bow!
And, fwelling to embrace the light,
Spreads around beneath the fight.
Old caftles on the cliffs arife,
Proudly tow'ring in the skies!
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