Classic Poem

OR, POETICAL ENTHUSIASM

The Muse! whate'er the Muse inspires,
My soul the tuneful strain admires:
The Poet's birth, I ask not where,
His place, his name, they're not my care:
Nor Greece nor Rome delights me more
Than Tagus' bank, or Thames's shore
From silver Avon's flowery side
Though Shakspeare's numbers sweetly glide,
As sweet, from Morven's desert hills,
My ear the voice of Ossian fills.

The Muse! whate'er the Muse inspires,
My soul the tuneful strain admires:
Nor bigot zeal, nor party rage
Prevail, to make me blame the page;
I scorn not all that Dryden sings,
Because he flatters courts and kings;
And from the master lyre of Gray,
When pomp of music breaks away,
Not less the sound my notice draws,
For that 'tis heard in Freedom's cause.

The Muse! whate'er the Muse inspires,
My soul the tuneful strain admires:
Where Wealth's bright sun propitious shines,
No added lustre marks the lines;
Where Want extends her chilling shades,
No pleasing flower of Fancy fades;
A scribbling peer's applauded lays
Might claim, but claim in vain, my praise
From that poor Youth, whose tales relate
Sad Juga's fears and Bawdin's fate.

The Muse! whate'er the Muse inspires,
My soul the tuneful strain admires:
When Fame her wreath well-earn'd bestows,
My breast no latent envy knows;
My Langhorne's verse I lov'd to hear,
And Beattie's song delights my ear;
And his, whom Athens' Tragic Maid
Now leads through Scarning's lonely glade,
While he for British nymphs bids flow
Her notes of terror and of woe.

The Muse! whate'er the Muse inspires,
My soul the tuneful strain admires:
Or be the verse or blank or rhyme,
The theme or humble or sublime;
If Pastoral's hand my journey leads
Through harvest fields or new-mown meads;
If Epic's voice sonorous calls
To oeta's cliffs' or Saiem's walls;
Enough — the Muse, the Muse inspires!
My soul the tuneful strain admires.