A MORNING SOLILOQUY ON DEAFNESS.

BY —.

NATURE! thy genial call I hear,
 Which wakes the morn and me,
 And seems to strike upon my ear,
 Tho' deaf to all but thee:
 To me the hours in silence roll away;
 No music greets the dawn, or mourns the close of day. 

To me the sky-larks, pois'd aloft,
 In silence seem to play,
 And hail no more in warblings soft
 The rising dawn of day;
 For me in vain they swell their liquid throats,
 Contemplative I muse, nor hear the jocund notes. 

To me the shepherd pipes in vain,
 In vain the milkmaid sings;
 Lost are the bleatings of the plain,
 The gurgling of the springs;
 No more I hear the nightingale complain,
 When to the moon she chaunts her sad love-labour'd strain. 

And when with me Lucinda strays
 Along the breezy grove,
 In transport on her charms I gaze,
 And think she talks of love:
 Ah! cease, dear maid, to talk of love in vain,
 For smiles alone to me the voice of love explain. 

Pygmalion thus, when he survey'd
 The work his hand had form'd,
 Enamour'd wish'd to see the maid
 With mutual passion warm'd,
 And as he woo'd his ear he oft inclin'd,
 Whilst yet no voice of love reliev'd his anxious mind. 

Cease thy complaints (methinks ev'n now
 The voice of Reason cries)
 Dispel the gloom that clouds thy brow,
 Suppress the heaving sighs:
 What Fate decrees 'tis folly to bewail;
 Weigh then the good and ill in Wisdom's equal scale. 

No more in Friendship's thin disguise
 Shall Flattery soothe thine ear,
 Experienc'd kindness makes thee wise,
 To know thy friend sincere;
 No more shalt thou attend to Faction's cries,
 The taunts of jealous Pride, or Envy's blasting lyes. 

No more shall now thy mind be tost
 By every breath of praise;
 No more thy reason shall be lost
 In controversy's maze;
 Thou safe thro' life's sequester'd vale shalt go,
 And learn from Nature's works her wise decrees to know.