CHARACTERS.

O BORN to soothe distress and lighten care,

Lively as soft, and innocent as fair!

Blest with that sweet simplicity of thought

So rarely found, and never to be taught;
Of winning speech, endearing, artless, kind,
The loveliest pattern of a female mind;
Like some fair spirit from the realms of rest,
With all her native heaven within her breast;
So pure, so good, she scarce can guess at sin,
But thinks the world without like that within;

Such melting tenderness, so fond to bless,

Her charity almost becomes excess.

Wealth may be courted, Wisdom be revered,

And Beauty praised, and brutal Strength be feared;

But Goodness only can affection move,

And love must owe its origin to love.

Illam quicquid agit, quoquo vestigia flectit,
Componit furtim, subsequiturque decor.

TIBUL.

OF gentle manners, and of taste refined,

With all the graces of a polished mind;

Clear sense and truth still shone in all she spoke,

And from her lips no idle sentence broke.

Each nicer elegance of art she knew;

Correctly fair, and regularly true.

Her ready fingers plied with equal skill

The pencil's task, the needle, or the quill;
So poised her feelings, so composed her soul,
So subject all to reason's calm controul,—

One only passion, strong and unconfined,

Disturbed the balance of her even mind:

One passion ruled despotic in her breast,

In every word, and look, and thought confest :But that was love; and love delights to bless

The generous transports of a fond excess.

HAPPY old man! who stretched beneath the shade

Of large grown trees, or in the rustic porch
With woodbine canopied, where linger yet
The hospitable virtues, calm enjoy'st
Nature's best blessings all;-a healthy age
Ruddy and vigorous, native cheerfulness,
Plain-hearted friendship, simple piety,

The rural manners and the rural joys

Friendly to life. O rude of speech, yet rich

In genuine worth, not unòbserved shall

pass

Thy bashful virtues! for the Muse shall mark,

Detect thy charities, and call to light

Thy secret deeds of mercy; while the poor,

The desolate and friendless, at thy gate,

A numerous family, with better praise

Shall hallow in their hearts thy spotless name.

SUCH were the dames of old heroic days,

Which faithful story yet delights to praise;

Who, great in useful works, hung o'er the loom,

The mighty mothers of immortal Rome:

Obscure, in sober dignity retired,

They more deserved than sought to be admired; The household virtues o'er their honoured head Their simple grace and modest lustre shed: Chaste their attire, their feet unused to roam, They loved the sacred threshold of their home;

Yet true to glory, fanned the generous flame,
Bade lovers, brothers, sons aspire to fame ;
In the young bosom cherished Virtue's seed,
The secret springs of many a godlike deed.
So the fair stream in some sequestered glade
With lowly state glides silent through the shade;
Yet by the smiling meads her urn is blest,
With freshest flowers her rising banks are drest,
And groves of laurel, by her sweetness fed,
High o'er the forest lift their verdant head.

Is there whom genius and whom taste adorn

With rare but happy union; in whose breast

Calm, philosophic, thoughtful, largely fraught

With stores of various knowledge, dwell the powers

That trace out secret causes, and unveil

Great Nature's awful face? Is there whose hours