No blight shall on his leaf descend, His every thought and deed. But for the unrepenting race, Not such their transient day, They are like chaff, which wild winds chase, Scatter'd from earth away. Therefore the wicked shall not stand For He discerns the pure of heart, Which strikes them from the world. 137TH PSALM PARAPHRASED. By clear Euphrates' palmy tide Our silent harps on trees we hung How shall we sing the sacred strains, O Solyma! that flow'd, And taught thy echoing rocks and plains The mercies of our God! If thee, Jerusalem, my heart E'er ceases to regret, Let my right hand its tuneful art, And all its skill forget! If I forget thee, let my tongue, Remember Edom's sons, O Lord! Howling aloud their fell award When red with Idumean gore Fair Olivet was found, These fanes, they cried, shall rise no more, Down with them to the ground! Daughter of Babylon, thy doom, And blest the man, whom Heav'n ordains To 'whelm thy boasted towers, And dash thy infants on the plains, As thou did'st slaughter ours! TO CHARLES SIMPSON, Esq. BARRISTER; WITH THOS. WARTON'S EDITION OF MILTON'S LESSER POEMS, ENRICHED BY THE EDITOR'S CRITICAL NOTES. ACCEPT, most worthy of thy studious hours, Rival of JOHNSON's tomes in every glow That Talent sheds, or Judgment can bestow; 1. 4. Dim thoughts-Mr T. Warton has shewed how largely Milton drew from the English poets who preceded him. 1. 7. Johnson's tomes-Lives of the Poets. Guiltless of all which stains their specious page, Accept it, SIMPSON, who art skill'd to rove, O! while this great essay of learned art Meets thy clear judgment, charms thy liberal heart, Still may the donor thy kind friendship claim, Than gold more welcome, and more wish'd than fame! 1. 3. More learn'd-It is well known that, with the exception of Chaucer, Johnson knew little of our early obsolete poetry. Mr T. Warton, in this his ingenious and learned work, shews us the prima stamina of an infinite number of those poetic flowers which adorn the juvenilia of Milton's muse. The style of Mr T. Warton's notes is eloquent in the first degree. We often find passages whose oratoric force and beauty equal the finest sentences of Dr Johnson. |