II.— AUREA DICTA.

‘ Tis truth ( although this truth's a star

Too deep-enskied for all to see ),

As poets of grammar, lovers are

The fountains of morality.

Child, would you shun the vulgar doom,

In love disgust, in death despair?

Know, death must come and love must come,

And so for each your soul prepare.

Who pleasure follows pleasure slays;

God's wrath upon himself he wreaks;

But all delights rejoice his days

Who takes with thanks, and never seeks.

The wrong is made and measured by

The right's inverted dignity.

Change love to shame, as love is high

So low in hell your bed shall be.

How easy to keep free from sin!

How hard that freedom to recall!

For dreadful truth it is that men

Forget the heavens from which they fall.

Lest sacred love your soul ensnare,

With pious fancy still infer

‘ How loving and how lovely fair

Must He be who has fashion'd her!’

Become whatever good you see,

Nor sigh if, forthwith, fades from view

The grace of which you may not be

The subject and spectator too.

Love's perfect blossom only blows

Where noble manners veil defect

Angels maybe familiar; those

Who err each other must respect.

Love blabb'd of is a great decline;

A careless word unsanctions sense;

But he who casts Heaven's truth to swine

Consummates all incontinence.

Not to unveil before the gaze

Of an imperfect sympathy

In aught we are, is the sweet praise

And the main sum of modesty.