144 Gratitude.-True Virtue. GRATITUDE. WHAT is grandeur? what is power? What the bright reward we gain? The bee's collected treasure sweet, Sweet music's melting fall;-but sweeter yet The still small voice of gratitude. GRAY. TRUE VIRTUE. GREAT minds, like Heav'n are pleas'd with doing good, Tho' the ungrateful subjects of their favours ROWE. Candour.-Fortitude. 145 CANDOUR. LET universal candour still, Clear as yon heav'n reflecting rill, Nor this nor that man's crooked ways To injure human-kind. AKENSIDE. FORTITUDE. THE gen'rous mind is by its suff'rings known, But when oppress'd will upward move, YALDEN. "WITH blue cold nose and wrinkled brow, Traveller, whence comest thou?” From Lapland woods and hills of frost By the rapid rein-deer crost; Where tap'ring grows the gloomy fir And the stunted juniper ; Where the wild hare and the crow Whiten in surrounding snow; Where the shiv'ring huntsmen tear His fur coat from the grim white bear; Prowl among the lonely rocks; And tardy suns to deserts drear And from teeming seas supply The food their niggard plains deny.' ORIGINAL. Snow.-Midnight. 147 SNOW. A SHOWER Of Soft and fleecy rain The universal mantle hides the trees, CONGREVE. MIDNIGHT. Now all is hush'd, as Nature were retir'd, And to the murmurs of the waters sleep: OTWAY TREES. No tree in all the grove but has its charms, Now green, now tawny, and, ere autumn yet bright. COWPER. |