Look to the east where Tamerlane display'd His crescent[B] moons and nations prostrate laid, March where he would, the world before him bow'd In conquest mighty, as of conquest proud-- What was the event? let tragic story tell While sad sensations in the bosom swell-- What were the effects? in every step we trace The wasteful havoc of a royal race, Once fertile fields a howling desert made The town in ashes, or the town decay'd, Degraded man to native wildness turn'd, His prospects clouded and his commerce spurn'd-- If such the outset of this mad career What will the last disgusting scene appear, Of all he conquer'd, when no more remains Than vagrant subjects, or unpeopled plains! [B] The three crescent moons in the turkish military standard, which had their origin, it is said, from the asiatic Tartars. Timurbeck (or Tamerlane) was of tartarian extraction.--_Freneau's note._ Thus, when ambition prompts the ardent mind, The soul, eccentric, frantic, unconfined, To peace a stranger, soars to heights unknown, And, slighting reason, yields the will to none; Mere passion rules, degrading powers prevail, And cool reflection quits the unbalanced scale. It leaves the haunts of happiness and rest To float on winds, disorder'd and unblest, Quits all the calm that nature meant for man To find some prize, or form the aspiring plan; That plan ungain'd, the object cheats the view, Or, if attain'd, they other marks pursue; Till all is closed in disappointment's shade And folly wonders at the flight she made: Ambition's self finds every prospect vain, The visions vanish, and the glooms remain. And such the vice, with nations as with man, Such the great failing since the world began: To power exalted, as to power they rose By honest toils, and humbling all their foes; That zenith gain'd, they covet vast domains And all, that pride from vast possession gains, Till glittering visions bring the uneasy sigh And uncontrol'd dominion blasts the eye. Britain! we cite you to our bar, once more; What but ambition urged you to our shore?-- To abridge our native rights, seven years you strove; Seven years were ours your arm of death to prove, To find, that conquest was your sovereign view; Your aims, to fetter, humble, and subdue, To seize a soil which not your labor till'd When the rude native scarcely we repell'd, When, with unbounded rage, their nations swore To hurl the out-law'd stranger from their shore, Or swell the torrent with their thousands slain No more to approach them, or molest their reign.-- What did we ask?--what right but reason owns? Yet even the mild petition met your frowns. Submission, only, to a monarch's will Could calm your rage, or bid your storm be still,