For he was frail, as thou or I,

And evil felt within:

But, when he felt it, heaved a sigh,
And loathed the thought of sin.

Such lived Aspasio; and at last
Call'd up from earth to Heaven,
The gulf of death triumphant pass'd,
By gales of blessing driven.

His joys be mine, each Reader cries, When my last hour arrives:

They shall be yours, my Verse replies, Such only be your lives.

ON A SIMILAR OCCASION,

FOR THE YEAR 1790.

Ne commonentem recta sperne.

Despise not my good counsel.

BUCHANAN.

HE who sits from day to day,
Where the prison'd lark is hung,
Heedless of his loudest lay,

Hardly knows what he has sung.

Where the watchman in his round
Nightly lifts his voice on high,
None, accustom'd to the sound,
Wakes the sooner for his cry.

So your verse-man I, and clerk,
Yearly in my song proclaim
Death at hand-yourselves his mark-
And the foe's unerring aim.

Duly at my time I come,

Publishing to all aloud

Soon the grave must be your home,

And your only suit, a shroud.

But the monitory strain,

Oft repeated in your ears,
Seems to sound too much in vain,
Wins no notice, wakes no fears.

Can a truth, by all confess'd

Of such magnitude and weight,
Grow, by being oft impress'd,
Trivial as a parrot's prate?

Pleasure's call attention wins,
Hear it often as we may;
New as ever seem our sins,
Though committed every day.

Death and Judgment, Heaven and Hell-
These alone, so often heard,
No more move us than the bell,
When some stranger is interr'd.

O then, ere the turf or tomb
Cover us from every eye,

Spirit of instruction come,

Make us learn that we must die.

ON A SIMILAR OCCASION,

FOR THE YEAR 1792.

Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas,
Atque metus omnes et inexorabile fatum
Subjecit pedibus,strepitumque Acherontis avari!
VIRG.

Happy the mortal, who has traced effects
To their first cause, cast fear beneath his feet,
And Death, and roaring Hell's voracious fires!

THANKLESS for favours from on high,
Man thinks he fades too soon;
Though 'tis his privilege to die,
Would he improve the boon.

But he, not wise enough to scan

His bless'd concerns aright,

Would gladly stretch life's little span

To ages, if he might.

To ages in a world of pain,

To ages, where he goes

Gall'd by affliction's heavy chain,

And hopeless of repose.

Strange fondness of the human heart,

Enamour'd of its harm!

Strange world, that costs it so much smart,
And still has power to charm.

Whence has the world her magic power?

Why deem we death a foe?

Recoil from weary life's best hour,

And covet longer wo?

The cause is Conscience-Conscience oft
Her tale of guilt renews:

'Her voice is terrible though soft,
And dread of death ensues.

Then, anxious to be longer spared,
Man mourns his fleeting breath:
All evils then seem light, compared
With the approach of Death.

'Tis judgment shakes him; there's the fear, That prompts the wish to stay:

He has incurr'd a long arrear,
And must despair to pay.

Pay!-follow Christ, and all is paid;
His death your peace ensures;
Think on the grave where he was laid,
And calm descend to yours.