Soft ruler of the feeling heart,
Whose very pains more bliss impart
Than stupid Folly's joy—
Delightful Love! my soul inspire,
Teach me to tune I ERNE'S Lyre
To social amity.

Warm'd by thy beautifying ray,
The gentle virgin's charms display
A more resistless grace;
Thy presence decks her lovely mein,
And points her eyes with light serene,
Mild-beaming o'er her face.

Fair sister of meek Charity,
O! condescend to live with me,
Thy willing votary;
My mind with lively pity move,
The feelings of my heart improve,

Down in the valley,
Valley so low,
Hang your head over,
Hear the train blow.

Hear the train blow, love,
Hear the train blow,
Hang your head over,
Hear the train blow.

If you don't love me,
Love whom you please,
But throw your arms round me,
Give my heart ease.

Step right up to me,
Before it's too late.
Throw your arms round me,
Feel my heart break.

I'll write you a letter,
Only three lines:
"Answer my question,
Will you be mine?'

Go build me a castle,
Forty feet high,
So I can see you,
As you pass by.

Auspicious poet, wert thou not my friend,
How could I envy, what I must commend!
But since 't is nature's law, in love and wit,
That youth should reign, and with'ring age submit,
With less regret those laurels I resign,
Which, dying on my brows, revive on thine.
With better grace an ancient chief may yield
The long contended honors of the field,
Than venture all his fortune at a cast,
And fight, like Hannibal, to lose at last.
Young princes, obstinate to win the prize,
Tho' yearly beaten, yearly yet they rise;

You say this world's dire need is love,
But O, in this be not misled;
Your hope must fiercely shine above
An epicure's indulgent bed.

Better the fiercest hatred born
Than that amœban death in life
That waits, with liquid eyes forlorn,
A happiness exempt from strife:

That octopus whose filthy arms
Would clasp the world to feed its ease:
That siren whose lascivious charms
Are bent her sickly lust to please.

Love stands upon the mountain height
And bids you strain your keenest nerve
To reach the peaks of her delight,

You ask, my soul, that this our mutual love
In fondness, as duration, might excel:
Great gods direct that she but constant prove,
And that she speaks but true, who speaks so well!
Then, gently bound in friendship's holy tie,
We'll both together live, together die!

Think'st thou, I'd rail at her I prize,
The nymph that's dearer than these eyes?
I ne'er had any cause, I vow!
Or, if I had, my ardent love
Too strong an obstacle would prove——
But Tappo's sland'rous; so art thou!

Tho' I hate, yet I love!—you'll perhaps ask me, how?
I can't tell; but I'm vext, and I feel that I do.

No nymph, amid the much-lov'd few,
Is lov'd, as thou art lov'd by me:
No love was e'er so fond, so true,
As my fond love, sweet maid, for thee!

Yes, e'en thy faults, bewitching fair!
With such delights my soul possess;
That whether faithless, or sincere,
I cannot love thee more, nor less!

My nymph averr'd, that mine alone
She'd be, and Jove himself despise;
Tho' courted to partake his throne,
And reign the empress of the skies!

Thus did the flatt'rer fondly swear;
But what, alas, are woman's vows?
Fit to be written but on air,
Or on the stream that swiftly flows!

All that was mine—I have loved it, and loved it both true and well.
Quick to its call I uprose, as the heart to the sacring-bell.
Never so long ago, nor aught that I loved as a child,
And lost, but I love it still and would seek it unreconciled.
Never so far past by, that broken its image appears,
Blent with dissolving visions or dim in the rush of the years!
Never so cast away, flung out on the world's rough wake,
But only the more would I love it—at need would go down for its sake.

All that was mine—I have loved it. Had greater than this been mine,