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And slumbering oscitancy mars the brood?
The nurse no doubt. Regardless of her charge
She needs herself correction; needs to learn,
That it is dangerous sporting with the world,
With things so sacred as a nation's trust,
The nurture of her youth, her dearest pledge.

All are not such. I had a brother oncePeace to the memory of a man of worth, A man of letters, and of manners too! Of manners sweet as virtue always wears, When gay good-nature dresses her in smiles. He graced a college*, in which order yet Was sacred; and was honoured, loved, and wept, By more than one, themselves conspicuous there. Some minds are tempered happily, and mixt With such ingredients of good sense, and taste Of what is excellent in man, they thirst With such a zeal to be what they approve, That no restraint can circumscribe them more Than they themselves by choice, for wisdom's sake; Nor can example hurt them: what they see Of vice in others but enhancing more The charms of virtue in their just esteem. If such escape contagion, and emerge Pure from so foul a pool to shine abroad,

* Ben'et Coll. Cambridge.

And give the world their talents and themselves, Small thanks to those whose negligence or sloth Exposed their inexperience to the snare,

And left them to an undirected choice.

See then the quiver broken and decayed,
In which are kept our arrows! Rusting there
In wild disorder, and unfit for use,

What wonder if, discharged into the world,
They shame their shooters with a random flight,
Their points obtuse and feathers drunk with wine!
Well may the church wage unsuccessful war
With such artillery armed. Vice parries wide
The undreaded volley with a sword of straw,
And stands an impudent and fearless mark.
Have we not tracked the felon home, and found
His birth place and his dam? The country mourns,
Mourns because every plague, that can infest
Society, and that saps and worms the base
Of the edifice, that policy has raised,

Swarms in all quarters: meets the eye, the ear,
And suffocates the breath at every turn.
Profusion breeds them; and the cause itself
Of that calamitous mischief has been found:
Found too where most offensive, in the skirts
Of the robed pedagogue! Else let the arraigned
Stand up unconscious, and refute the charge.
So, when the Jewish leader stretched his arm,

And waved his rod divine, a race obscene,
Spawned in the muddy beds of Nile, cam orth,
Polluting Egypt: gardens, fields, and plains,
Were covered with the pest; the streets were filled;
The croaking nuisance lurked in every nook ;
Nor palaces, nor even chambers, 'scaped;
And the land stank-so numerous was the fry,

THE TASK.

BOOK III.

THE GARDEN.

The Argument.

Self-recollection and reproof.-Address to domestic happiness. Some account of myself. The vanity of many of their pursuits who are reputed wise.Justification of my censures.-Divine illumination necessary to the most expert philosopher.-The question, What is truth? answered by other questions.-Domestic happiness addressed again.-Few lovers of the country.-My tame hare.-Occupations of a retired gentleman in his garden.-Pruning.-Framing.-Greenhouse.-Sowing of flower. seeds. The country preferable to the town even in the winter.-Reasons why it is deserted at that season. Ruinous effects of gaming and of expensive improvement.-Book concludes with an apostrophe to the metropolis.

As one, who long in thickets and in brakes
Entangled winds now this way and now that
His devious course uncertain, seeking home;
Or, having long in miry ways been foiled

And sore discomfited, from slough to slough
Plunging and half despairing of escape;

If chance at length he find a greensward smooth
And faithful to the foot, his spirits rise,

He chirrups brisk his ear-erecting steed,
And winds his way with pleasure and with ease;
So I, designing other themes, and called

To adorn the Sofa with eulogium due,

To tell its slumbers, and to paint its dreams,
Have rambled wide. In country, city, seat
Of academic fame (however deserved),
Long held, and scarcely disengaged at last.
But now with pleasant pace a cleanlier road
I mean to tread. I feel myself at large,
Courageous and refreshed for future toil,
If toil await me, or if dangers new.

Since pulpits fail, and sounding boards reflect Most part and empty ineffectual sound, What chance that I to fame so little known, Nor conversant with men or manners much, Should speak to purpose, or with better hope Crack the satiric thong? 'Twere wiser far For me, enamoured of sequestered scenes, And charmed with rural beauty, to repose, Where chance may throw me, beneath elm or vine, My languid limbs, when summer sears the plains; Or, when rough winter. rages, on the soft

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