Classic Poem

CHARACTER IV.

DIFFIDENCE .

STELLA.

For your own Stella, Muses — she whose thirst
With eager stealth Castalia's stream pursues,
A garland weave of flowers, the happy growth
Of Heliconian groves, and bind the wreath
With laurels, crop'd from Delphos, — grace must mark
The fair selection: Taste arrange the flowers.
No gaudy foliage, no ill sorted hues,
No over-weening blossoms. Simple all
In unobtrusive elegance. It suits
The mind of Stella, the ingenuous mind,
Cultur'd by science and by sense inform'd.
Which, like the primrose, from the trodden path
Of life retires to decorate the vale.
Ye supercilious spirits, who despise
The blush of Diffidence, the sober charm
Of gentleness and reason, the sweet tear,
That feeling claims from timid modesty,
Alive to shame and fearful to offend,
Who with the noisy laugh of wit can drown
The faultering voice of merit, that disdains
To urge her pleas, save to attention's ear.
Know, the rich gem, your folly proudly spurns,
Bears on its surface grav'd the heavenly from
Of unassuming genius. Friendship there,
Rob'd in her Roman stola, careful lights
Her radiant lamp at Virtue's deathless flame.
Beside her Sympathy, a weeping grace,
Crown'd with the drooping lilly of the vale,
Sits smiling through her tears. Fidelity,
A goddess rarely found, and strongly mark'd
By truth's irradiate beams, is there pourtray'd.
She, by the fickle world deceiv'd and scorn'd,
In Stella's bosom finds a safe retreat,
And builds her peaceful habitation there.