Here let me, careless and unthoughtful lying, Hear the soft winds, above me flying, With all their wanton boughs dispute, And the more tuneful birds to both replying, Nor be myself too mute. V. A silver stream shall roll his waters near, Gilt with the sunbeams here and there, On whose enamelled bank I’ll walk, And see how prettily they smile, and hear How prettily they talk. VI. Ah wretched, and too solitary he Who loves not his own company! He’ll feel the weight of’t many a day, Unless he call in sin or vanity To help to bear’t away. VII. Oh solitude, first state of human-kind! Which blest remained till man did find Even his own helper’s company. As soon as two, alas, together joined, The serpent made up three. VIII. Though God himself, through countless ages, thee His sole companion chose to be, Thee, sacred Solitude alone; Before the branchy head of numbers Three Sprang from the trunk of One. IX. Thou (though men think thine an unactive part) Dost break and tame th’ unruly heart, Which else would know no settled pace, Making it move, well managed by thy art With swiftness and with grace. X. Thou the faint beams of Reason’s scattered light Dost like a burning glass unite; Dost multiply the feeble heat, And fortify the strength, till thou dost bright And noble fires beget. XI. Whilst this hard truth I teach, methinks, I see The monster London laugh at me; I should at thee too, foolish city, If it were fit to laugh at misery. But thy estate, I pity. XII. Let but thy wicked men from out thee go, And the fools that crowd thee so,— Even thou, who dost thy millions boast, A village less than Islington wilt grow, A solitude almost. OF OBSCURITY. _Nam neque divitibus contingunt gaudia solis_, _Nec vixit male_, _qui natus moriensque fefellit_. God made not pleasures only for the rich, Nor have those men without their share too lived, Who both in life and death the world deceived. THIS seems a strange sentence thus literally translated, and looks as if it were in vindication of the men of business (for who else can deceive the world?) whereas it is in commendation of those who live and die so obscurely, that the world takes no notice of them. This Horace calls deceiving the world, and in another place uses the same phrase. _Secretum iter et fallentis semita vitæ_. The secret tracks of the deceiving life.