Works

Too many, Lord, abuse thy grace,
In this licentious day;
And while they boast they see thy face,
They turn their own away.


Thy book displays a gracious light
That can the blind restore;...

And dwells there in a female heart,
By bounteous Heaven design'd,
The choicest raptures to impart,
To feel the most refined'


Dwells there a wish in such a breast
Its nature to forego,...

Hear, Lord, the song of praise and prayer
In heaven thy dwelling-place,
From infants made the public care,
And taught to seek thy face.


Thanks for thy word and for thy day,...

I ransack'd for a theme of song,
Much ancient chronicle, and long;
I read of bright embattled fields,
Of trophied helmets, spears, and shields,
Of chiefs, whose single arm could boast...

Say, ye apostate and profane,
Wretches, who blush not to disdain
Allegiance to your God,'
Did e'er your idly wasted love
Of virtue for her sake remove
And lift you from the crowd?

...

Reader! behold a monument
That asks no sigh or tear,
Though it perpetuate the event
Of a great burial here.
June 1790. Anno 1791.

Where Humber pours his rich commercial stream
There dwelt a wretch, who breathed but to blaspheme;
In subterraneous caves his life he led,
Black as the mine in which he wrought for bread....

When the British warrior queen,
Bleeding from the Roman rods,
Sought, with an indignant mien,
Counsel of her country's gods,


Sage beneath the spreading oak
Sat the Druid, hoary chief;...

Believe it or not, as you choose,
The doctrine is certainly true,
That the future is known to the muse,
And poets are oracles too.
I did but express a desire
To see Catharina at home,...

Thee, whose refulgent staff and summons clear,
Minerva's flock longtime was wont t'obey,
Although thyself an herald, famous here,
The last of heralds, Death, has snatch'd away....

Time, never wand'ring from his annual round,
Bids Zephyr breathe the Spring, and thaw the ground;
Bleak Winter flies, new verdure clothes the plain,
And earth assumes her transient youth again....

These are not dewdrops, these are tears,
And tears by Sally shed
For absent Robin, who she fears,
With too much cause, is dead.


One morn he came not to her hand
As he was wont to come,...

Here lies, whom hound did ne'er pursue,
Nor swifter greyhound follow,
Whose foot ne'er tainted morning dew,
Nor ear heard huntsman's halloo;


Old Tiney, surliest of his kind,...

Here Johnson lies'a sage by all allow'd,
Whom to have bred may well make England proud,
Whose prose was eloquence, by wisdom taught,
The graceful vehicle of virtuous thought;...

Though once a puppy, and though Fop by name,
Here moulders one whose bones some honour claim.
No sycophant, although of spaniel race,
And though no hound, a martyr to the chace'...

Tears flow, and cease not, where the good man lies,
Till all who knew him follow to the skies.
Tears therefore fall where Chester's ashes sleep;
Him wife, friends, brothers, children, servants weep'...

Laurels may flourish round the conqueror's tomb,
But happiest they who win the world to come:
Believers have a silent field to fight,
And their exploits are veil'd from human sight....

Says the pipe to the snuff-box, I can't understand
What the ladies and gentlemen see in your face,
That you are in fashion all over the land,
And I am so much fallen into disgrace.

...

Holy Lord God! I love thy truth,
Nor dare thy least commandment slight;
Yet pierced by sin, the serpent's tooth,
I mourn the anguish of the bite.


But, though the poison lurks within,...

Poets attempt the noblest task they can,
Praising the Author of all good in man,
And, next, commemorating worthies lost,
The dead in whom that good abounded most....