To fill the languid pause with finer joy;

Unknown those powers that raise the soul to flame,

Catch every nerve, and vibrate through the frame:

19

Their level life is but a smouldering fire,

Unquench’d by want, unfann’d by strong desire;

Unfit for raptures, or, if raptures cheer,

On some high festival of once a year,

In wild excess the vulgar breast takes fire,

Till, buried in debauch, the bliss expire.

But not their joys alone thus coarsely flow—

flow—

Their morals, like their pleasures, are but low;

For, as refinement stops, from sire to son

Unalter’d, unimprov’d, the manners run—

run—

And love’s and friendship’s finely pointed dart

Fall blunted from each indurated heart.

Some sterner virtues o’er the mountain’s breast

May sit, like falcons cowering on the nest;

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