INTRODUCTION. XXxili 
But hark ! whilst thus I musing stand, 
Pours on the gale an airy note 5 
And, breathing from a viewless hand, 
Soft silvery tones around me float! 
They cease—but still a voice I hear, 
A whisper’d voice of hope and joy, 
** Thy hour of rest approaching near, 
Prepare thee, mortal! thou must die! 
** Yet, start not !—on thy closing eyes 
Another day shall still unfold, 
A sun of milder radiance rise, 
A happier age of joys untold. 
* Shall the poor worm that shocks thy sight, 
The humblest form in Nature’s train, - 
Thus rise in new-born lustre bright, 
And yet the emblem teach in vain ? 
Ah! where were once her golden eyes, 
Her glittering wings of purple pride ? 
Conceal’d beneath a rude disguise, 
A shapeless mass, to earth allied. 
** Like thee the hapless reptile lived, 
Like thee he toil’d, like thee he spun, 
Like thine his closing hour arrived, 
His labour ceased, his web was done, 
* And shalt thou, number’d with the dead, 
No happier state of being know ? 
And shall no future morrow shed 
On thee a beam of brighter glow ? 
