po Miscellaneous Poems.

The Hills aoorn’d with Vines, with Flow'rs the Plain,Without the Sun's too near Approach, serene :

But Heav’n in vain does on the Vineyards smile,-The Monarch’s Glory mocks the Lab’rcr’s Toil.

What tho’elab’ratv. Brass with Nature strive,

And proud Equestrian Figures seem alive ;

With various Terrors on their Basts wrought,

With yielding Citadels, surpriz'd or bought ?

And here the Ruins of a taken Town,

There a bombarded Steeple tumbling down :

"Such Prodigies of Art, or costly Pains,

Serve but to gild th' unthinking Rabble’s Chains.

O despicable State os all that groanUnder a blind Dependency on One !

How far inferior to the Herds that range,

With native Freedom, o’er the Woods and Plains!With them no Fallacies of Schools prevail,

Nor of a Right Divine, the nauseous Tale,

Can give to one among themselves the Pow’r,Without Controul, his Fellows to devour.

To reasoning human Kind alone, belongThe Arts to hurt themselves by reas’ning \jxong,Howe’er the foolish Notion first began,

Of trusting Abstolute to lawless Man :

Howe’er a Tyrant may by Force subsist;

For who would be a Slave that can resist ?

Those set the Casuist safest on the Throne,

Who make the People’s Interest their own ;

And chusing rather to be lov’d than fear’d,

Are Kings of Men, not of a servile Herd.

O Liberty ! too late desir’d, when lost;

Like Health, when wanted, thou art valu’d most !

In Regions where no Property is known,

Thro’ which the Garone runs, and rapid Rhone,Where Peasants toil for Harvest not their own;

How gladly would they quit their native Soil,

And change for Liberty their Wine and Oil !