Thou golden shower of a true Jove!

[love!

Who does in thee descend, and heaven to earth make

Hail, active Nature's watchful life and health!

Her joy, her ornament, and wealth!

1

[he!

Hail to thy husband Heat, and thee! 'Thou the world's beauteous bride, the lusty bridegroom

Say from what golden quivers of the sky
Do all thy winged arrows fly?

Swiftness and power by birth are thine:

From thy great sire they came, thy sire the Word Divine.

"Tis, I believe, this archery to show,

That so much cost in colours thou,

And skill in painting, dost bestow,

Upon thy ancient arms, the gaudy heavenly bow.

Swift as light thoughts their empty career run,
Thy race is finish'd when begun;

Let a post-angel start with thee,

And thou the goal of earth shalt reach as soon as he.

Thou in the moon's bright chariot, proud and gay, Dost thy bright wood of stars survey;

And all the year dost with thee bring Of thousand flowery lights thine own nocturnal spring.

Thou, Scythian-like, dost round thy lands above The sun's gilt tents for ever move,

And still, as thou in pomp dost go,

The shining pageants of the world attend thy show.

Nor amidst all these triumphs dost thou scorn
The humble glow-worms to adorn,

And with those living spangles gild

(O greatness without pride!) the bushes of the field.

Night, and her ugly subjects, thou dost fright,

And Sleep, the lazy owl of night;
Asham'd, and fearful to appear,

[sphere.

They skreen their horrid shapes with the black hemi

With them there hastes, and wildly takes th' alarm,

Of painted dreams a busy swarm :

At the first opening of thine

eye

The various clusters break, the antick atoms fly.

The guilty serpents, and obscener beasts,
Creep, conscious, to their secret rests:
Nature to thee does reverence pay,

Ill omens and ill sights removes out of thy way.

At thy appearance, Grief itself is said

To shake his wings, and rouse his head:
And cloudy Care has often took

A gentle beamy smile, reflected from thy look.

Encourag'd at the sight of thee,

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

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

To Darkness' curtains he retires;

In sympathizing night he rolls his smoky fires,

When, Goddess! thou lift'st 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 rising day.

The ghosts, and monster-spirits, that did presume A body's privilège to assume,

Vanish again invisibly,

And bodies gain again their visibility.

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

Thou the rich dye on them bestow'st,

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

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 swaddling-bands:

On the fair tulip thou dost doat;

Thou cloth'st it in a gay and parti-colour'd coat.

With flame condens'd thou dost thy jewels fix,
And solid colours in it mix :

Flora herself envies to see

Flowers fairer than her own, and durable as she.

Ah, Goddess! would thou couldst thy hand withhold, And be less liberal to gold!

Didst thou less value to it give,

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

To me the sun 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 soft ways of heaven, and air, and sea, Which open all their pores to thee,

Like a clear river thou dost glide,

And with thy living stream through the close channels slide.

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

Takes there possession, and does make,

Of colours mingled light, a thick and standing lake.

But the vast ocean of unbounded day

In th' empyræan heaven does stay.

Thy rivers, lakes, and springs, below,

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

то

THE ROYAL SOCIETY.

PHILOSOPHY, the great and only heir
Of all that human knowledge which has been
Unforfeited by man's rebellious sin,
Though full of years he do appear
(Philosophy, I say, and call it He;
For, whatsoe'er the painter's fancy be,
It a male-virtue seems to me),

Has still been kept in nonage till of late,

Nor manag'd or enjoy'd his vast estate.

Three or four thousand years, one would have thought,
To ripeness and perfection might have brought
A science so well bred and nurst,
And of such hopeful parts too at the first:
But, oh! the guardians and the tutors then
(Some negligent and some ambitious men)
Would ne'er consent to set him free,
Or his own natural powers to let him see,
Lest that should put an end to their authority.

That his own business he might quite forget,
They amus'd him with the sports of wanton wit;

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