Have we not seen at pleasure's lordly call, E'en now, perhaps, as there some pilgrim strays Through tangled forests, and through dangerous ways; Where beasts with man divided empire claim, And the brown Indian marks with murd'rous aim The pensive exile, bending with his woe, Vain, very vain, my weary search to find every government, though terrors reign, With secret course, which no loud storms annoy, The lifted axe, the agonizing wheel, Luke's iron crown, and Damien's bed of steel, To men remote from power but rarely known, Leave reason, faith, and conscience, all our own. ΤΟ DR GOLDSMITH, AUTHOR OF. THE DESERTED VILLAGE. BY MISS AIKIN, AFTERWARDS MRS BARBAULD. In vain fair Auburn weeps her desert plains; The poet had not While one-one poet yet remains like thee. TO SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. DEAR SIR, I CAN have no expectations, in an address of this kind, either to add to your reputation, or to establish my own. You can gain nothing from my admiration, as I am ignorant of that art in which you are said to excel; and I may lose much by the severity of your judgment, as few have a juster taste in poetry than you. Setting interest therefore aside, to which I never paid much attention, I must be indulged at present in following my affections. The only dedication I ever made was to my brother, because I loved him better than most other men. He is since dead. Permit me to inscribe this Poem to you. How far you may be pleased with the versification and mere mechanical parts of this attempt, I do not pretend to inquire; but I know you will object (and indeed several of our best and wisest friends concur in the opinion), that the depopulation it deplores is nowhere to be seen, and the disorders it laments are only to be found in the poet's own imagination. To this I can scarcely make any other answer than that I sincerely believe what I have written; that I have taken all possible pains, in my country excursions, for these four or five years past, to be certain of what I |