Suspend their crazy boxes, planted thick,

And watered duly. There the pitcher stands 775
A fragment, and the spoutless teapot there;
Sad witnesses how close-pent man regrets
The country, with what ardour he contrives
A peep at Nature, when he can no more.

785

Hail, therefore, patroness of health and ease 780
And contemplation, heart-consoling joys
And harmless pleasures, in the thronged abode
Of multitudes unknown! Hail, rural life!
Address himself who will to the pursuit
Of honours, or emolument, or fame,
I shall not add myself to such a chase,
Thwart his attempts, or envy his success.
Some must be great. Great offices will have
Great talents and God gives to every man
The virtue, temper, understanding, taste,
That lifts him into life, and lets him fall
Just in the niche he was ordained to fill.
To the deliverer of an injured land

He gives a tongue to enlarge upon, a heart
To feel, and courage to redress her wrongs;
To monarchs dignity; to judges sense;
To artists ingenuity and skill;

790

795

To me an unambitious mind, content

In the low vale of life, that early felt

A wish for ease and leisure, and ere long
Found here that leisure and that ease I wished.

800

ARGUMENT.

A FROSTY morning. The foddering of cattle. The woodman and his dog. The poultry. Whimsical effects of frost at a waterfall. The Empress of Russia's palace of ice. Amusements of monarchs. War, one of them. Wars, whence.'

And whence monarchy. The evils of it. English and French loyalty contrasted. The Bastille, and a prisoner there. Liberty the chief recommendation of this country. Modern patriotism questionable, and why. The perishable nature of the best human institutions. Spiritual liberty not perishable. The slavish state of man by nature. Deliver him, Deist, if you Grace must do it. The respective merits of patriots and martyrs stated. Their different treatment. Happy freedom of the man whom grace makes free. His relish of the works of God. Address to the Creator.

can.

THE TASK. BOOK V.

THE WINTER MORNING WALK.

IS morning; and the sun, with ruddy orb Ascending, fires the horizon; while the clouds

That crowd away before the driving wind,

More ardent as the disk emerges more,

Resemble most some city in a blaze,

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Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray Slides ineffectual down the snowy vale,

And, tinging all with his own rosy hue,

From every
herb and every spiry blade
Stretches a length of shadow o'er the field.
Mine, spindling into longitude immense,
In spite of gravity, and sage remark
That I myself am but a fleeting shade,
Provokes me to a smile. With eye askance
I view the muscular proportioned limb
Transformed to a lean shank.
As they designed to mock me,
Take step for step; and as I near approach
The cottage, walk along the plastered wall,
Preposterous sight! the legs without the man.

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15

The shapeless pair, side

at my

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