"Thy magic touch imagined forms supplies From colour'd light, the language of the eyes; 320 On Memory's page departed hours inscribes, Sweet scenes of youth, and Pleasure's vanish'd tribes. By thee ANTINOUS leads the dance sublime On wavy step, and moves in measured time; Charm'd round the Youth successive Graces throng, And Ease conducts him, as he moves along; Unbreathing crowds the floating form admire, And Vestal bosoms feel forbidden fire. "When rapp'd CECILIA breathes her matin vow, And lifts to Heaven her fair adoring brow; 330 From her sweet lips, and rising bosom part Impassion'd notes, that thrill the melting heart; Tuned by thy hand the dulcet harp she rings, And sounds responsive echo from the strings; Bright scenes of bliss in trains suggested move, And charm the world with melody and love. III. "SOON the fair forms with vital being bless'd, Time's feeble children, lose the boon possess'd; The goaded fibre ceases to obey, And sense deserts the uncontractile clay; 340 While births unnumber'd, ere the parents die, The hourly waste of lovely life supply; And thus, alternating with death, fulfil The silent mandates of the Almighty Will; Whose hand unseen the works of nature dooms By laws unknown--WHO GIVES, AND WHO RESUMES. [Footnote: _The goaded fibre_, l. 339. Old age consists in the inaptitude to motion from the inirritability of the system, and the consequent want of fibrous contraction; see Additional Note VII.] "Each pregnant Oak ten thousand acorns forms Profusely scatter'd by autumnal storms; Ten thousand seeds each pregnant poppy sheds Profusely scatter'd from its waving heads; 350 The countless Aphides, prolific tribe, With greedy trunks the honey'd sap imbibe; Swarm on each leaf with eggs or embryons big, And pendent nations tenant every twig. Amorous with double sex, the snail and worm, Scoop'd in the soil, their cradling caverns form; Heap their white eggs, secure from frost and floods, And crowd their nurseries with uncounted broods. Ere yet with wavy tail the tadpole swims, Breathes with new lungs, or tries his nascent limbs; 360 Her countless shoals the amphibious frog forsakes, And living islands float upon the lakes. The migrant herring steers her myriad bands From seas of ice to visit warmer strands; Unfathom'd depths and climes unknown explores, And covers with her spawn unmeasured shores. --All these, increasing by successive birth, Would each o'erpeople ocean, air, and earth.