ng eyes and kindling fancy, gleam
With somewhat of the vivid hues, that stream
From Poesy's bright orb, each envious stain
Shed by dull Critics, venal, vex'd and vain,
Seems recompens'd at full;--and so wou'd seem
Did not _maturer_ Sons of Phoebus deem
My verse Aonian.--Thou, in time, shalt gain,
Like them, amid the letter'd World, _that_ sway
Which makes encomium _fame_;--so thou adorn,
Extend, refine and dignify thy lay,
And Indolence, and Syren Pleasure scorn;
Then, at high noon, thy Genius shall display
The splendors promis'd in its shining morn.

SONNET LXVI.

Nobly to scorn thy gilded veil to wear,
Soft Simulation!--wisely to abstain
From fostering Envy's asps;--to dash the bane
Far from our hearts, which Hate, with frown severe,
Extends for those who wrong us;--to revere
With soul, or grateful, or resign'd, the train
Of mercies, and of trials, is to gain
A quiet Conscience, best of blessings here!--
Calm Conscience is a land-encircled bay,
On whose smooth surface Tempests never blow;
Which shall the reflex of our life display
Unstain'd by crime, tho' gloom'd with transient woe;
While the bright hopes of Heaven's eternal day
Upon the fair and silent waters glow.

SONNET LXVII.

ON DOCTOR JOHNSON'S UNJUST CRITICISMS
IN HIS
LIVES OF THE POETS[1].

Cou'd aweful Johnson want poetic ear,
Fancy, or judgment?--no! his splendid strain,
In prose, or rhyme, confutes that plea.--The pain
Which writh'd o'er Garrick's fortunes, shows us clear
_Whence_ all his spleen to GENIUS.--Ill to bear
A Friend's renown, that to his _own_ must reign,
Compar'd, a Meteor's evanescent train,
To Jupiter's fix'd orb, proves that each sneer,
Subtle and fatal to poetic Sense,
Did from insidious ENVY meanly flow,
Illumed with dazzling hues of eloquence,
And Sophist-Wit, that labor to o'er-throw
Th' awards of AGES, and new laws dispense
That lift the _mean_, and lay the MIGHTY low.

1: When Johnson's Idolaters are hard pressed concerning his injustice
in those _fallacious_ though _able_ pages;--when they are reminded
that he there tells us the perusal of Milton's Paradise Lost is a
_task_, and never a _pleasure_;--reminded also of his avowed contempt
of that exquisite Poem, the LYCIDAS;--of his declaration that
Dryden's absurd Ode on the death of Mrs. Anne Killegrew, writ