t can't ask her love.
She grants, indeed, a lady may decline
(All ladies but herself) at ninety-nine.
O how unlike her is the sacred age
Of prudent Portia! her gray hairs engage;
Whose thoughts are suited to her life's decline:
Virtue's the paint that can with wrinkles shine.
That, and that only, can old age sustain;
Which yet all wish, nor know they wish for pain.
Not num'rous are our joys, when life is new;
And yearly some are falling of the few;
But when we conquer life's meridian stage,
And downward tend into the vale of age,
They drop apace; by nature some decay,
And some the blasts of fortune sweep away;
Till naked quite of happiness, aloud
We call for death, and shelter in a shroud.
Where's Portia now?--But Portia left behind
Two lovely copies of her form and mind.
What heart untouch'd their early grief can view,
Like blushing rose-buds dipp'd in morning dew?
Who into shelter takes their tender bloom,
And forms their minds to flee from ills to come?
The mind, when turn'd adrift, no rules to guide,
Drives at the mercy of the wind and tide;
Fancy and passion toss it to and fro;
Awhile torment, and then quite sink in woe.
Ye beauteous orphans, since in silent dust
Your best example lies, my precepts trust.
Life swarms with ills; the boldest are afraid;
Where then is safety for a tender maid?
Unfit for conflict, round beset with woes,
And man, whom least she fears, her worst of foes!
When kind, most cruel; when oblig'd the most,
The least obliging; and by favours lost.
Cruel by nature, they for kindness hate;
And scorn you for those ills themselves create.
If on your fame your sex a blot has thrown,
'Twill ever stick, through malice of your own.
Most hard! in pleasing your chief glory lies;
And yet from pleasing your chief dangers rise:
Then please the best; and know, for men of sense,
Your strongest charms are native innocence.
Art on the mind, like paint upon the face,
Fright him, that's worth your love, from your embrace.
In simple manners all the secret lies;
Be kind and virtuous, you'll be blest and wise.
Vain show and noise intoxicate the brain,
Begin with giddiness, and end in pain.
Affect not empty fame, and idle praise,
Which, all those wretches I describe, betrays.
Your sex's glory 'tis, to shine unknown;
Of all applause, be fondest of your own.
Beware the fever of the mind! that thi