100 ORIGIN OF SOCIETY. CANTO in. 



Or if the dewy hands of Sleep, unhid, 

 O'er her blue eye-balls close the lovely lid, 

 Watches each nascent smile, and fleeting grace, 

 That plays in day-dreams o'er her blushing face; 200 

 Counts the fine mazes of the curls, that break 

 Round her fair ear, and shade her damask cheek; 

 Drinks the pure fragrance of her breath, and sips 

 With tenderest touch the roses of her lips; 

 O'er female hearts with chaste seduction reigns, 

 And binds SOCIETY in silken chains. 



IV. " IF the wide eye the wavy lawns explores, 

 The bending woodlands, or the winding shores, 



The wavy lawns, 1.207- When the babe, soon after it is born into 

 this cold world, is applied to its mother's bosom ; its sense of per- 

 ceiving warmth is first agreeably affected; next its sense of smell is 

 delighted with the odour of her milk; then its taste is gratified by the 

 flavour of it; afterwards the appetites of hunger and of thirst afford 

 pleasure by the possession of their objects, and by the subsequent di- 

 gestion of the aliment; and lastly, the sense of touch is delighted by 

 the softness and smoothness of the milky fountain, the source of such 

 variety of happiness. 



All these various kinds of pleasure at length become associated 

 with the form of the mother's breast ; which the infant embraces with 



