AN
EPISTLE
TO
DR. MOORE,

AUTHOR OF

A VIEW OF SOCIETY AND MANNERS
IN
FRANCE, SWITZERLAND, AND GERMANY.

I mean no giddy heights to climb,
And vainly toil to be sublime;
While every line with labour wrought,
Is swell’d with tropes for want of thought: 
Nor shall I call the Muse to shed
Castalian drops upon my head;
Or send me from Parnassian bowers
A chaplet wove of fancy’s flowers. 
At present all such aid I slight—­
My heart instructs me how to write.

That softer glide my hours along,
That still my griefs are sooth’d by song,
That still my careless numbers flow
To your successful skill I owe;
You, who when sickness o’er me hung,
And languor had my lyre unstrung,
With treasures of the healing art,
With friendship’s ardor at your heart,
From sickness snatch’d her early prey
And bade fair health—­the goddess gay,
With sprightly air, and winning grace,
With laughing eye, and rosy face,
Accustom’d when you call to hear,
On her light pinion hasten near,
And swift restore with influence kind,
My weaken’d frame, my drooping mind.

With like benignity, and zeal,
The mental malady to heal,
To stop the fruitless, hopeless tear,
The life you lengthen’d, render dear,
To charm by fancy’s powerful vein,
“The written troubles of the brain,”
From gayer scenes, compassion led
Your frequent footsteps to my shed: 
And knowing that the Muses’ art
Has power to ease an aching heart,
You sooth’d that heart with partial praise,
And I before too fond of lays,
While others pant for solid gain,
Grasp at a laurel sprig—­in vain—­
You could not chill with frown severe
The madness to my soul so dear;
For when Apollo came to store
Your mind with salutary lore,
The god I ween, was pleas’d to dart
A ray from Pindus on your heart;
Your willing bosom caught the fire,
And still is partial to the lyre.

But now from you at distance plac’d
Where Epping spreads a woody waste;
Tho’ unrestrain’d my fancy flies,
And views in air her fabrics rise,
And paints with brighter bloom the flowers,
Bids Dryads people all the bowers,
And Echoes speak from every hill,
And Naiads pour each little rill,
And bands of Sylphs with pride unfold
Their azure plumage mix’d with gold,
My heart remembers with a sigh
That you are now no longer nigh. 
The magic scenes no more engage,
I quit them for your various page;
Where, with delight I traverse o’er
The foreign paths you trod before: 
Ah not in vain those paths you trac’d,
With heart to feel, with powers to taste!