Seats of my childhood! yon low roofs impart
The mem'ry of those days, when pure from stain
I wander'd careless o'er your sylvan reign,
A stranger yet to wild Ambition's smart;
To Love's incurable deep-piercing dart,
Or Knowledge, man's chief ornament and bane,
That gives to feel with keener sense of pain
The various pangs, that wound the human heart.
But most your scenes to warm remembrance raise
A mother's tender looks, ere age decay'd
Her with'ring form, to shades of death consign'd,
In the first blossom of my vernal days,
The debt of filial piety unpaid,
That sweet employment to the virtuous mind.