Could nature’s bounty satisfy the breast, The sons of Italy were surely blest. Whatever fruits in different climes are found, That proudly rise, or humbly court the ground; Whatever blooms in torrid tracts appear, 115 Whose bright succession decks the varied year; Whatever sweets salute the northern sky With vernal lives, that blossom but to die; These, here disporting, own the kindred soil, Nor ask luxuriance from the planter’s toil; 120 While sea-born gales their gelid wings expand To winnow fragrance round the smiling land. But small the bliss that sense alone bestows, And sensual bliss is all this nation knows. In florid beauty groves and fields appear, 125 Man seems the only growth that dwindles here. Contrasted faults through all his manners reign: Though poor, luxurious; though submissive, vain; Though grave, yet trifling; zealous, yet untrue; And even in penance planning sins anew. 130 All evils here contaminate the mind, That opulence departed leaves behind; For wealth was theirs, not far remov’d the date, When commerce proudly flourished through the state. At her command the palace learnt to rise, 135 Again the long-fallen column sought the skies; The canvas glow’d beyond ev’n nature warm, The pregnant quarry teem’d with human form; Till, more unsteady than the southern gale, Commerce on other shores display’d her sail; 140 While nought remain’d of all that riches gave, But towns unmann’d, and lords without a slave: And late the nation found, with fruitless skill, Its former strength was but plethoric ill. Yet still the loss of wealth is here supplied 145 By arts, the splendid wrecks of former pride; From these the feeble heart and long-fallen mind An easy compensation seem to find. Here may be seen, in bloodless pomp array’d, The pasteboard triumph and the cavalcade; 150 Processions form’d for piety and love, A mistress or a saint in every grove. By sports like these are all their cares beguil’d, The sports of children satisfy the child; Each nobler aim, represt by long control, 155 Now sinks at last, or feebly mans the soul; While low delights, succeeding fast behind, In happier meanness occupy the mind. As in those domes where Cæsars once bore sway, Defac’d by time and tottering in decay, 160 There in the ruin, heedless of the dead, The shelter-seeking peasant builds his shed; And, wondering man could want the larger pile, Exults, and owns his cottage with a smile.