The LILY and NARCISSUS

“Ah! hapless discontented flow’r, “That yellow leaves adorn; “Who once in life’s gay vernal pride “The brightest nymphs could’st scorn.

“Hard was thy lot, and short thy date, “By form too fair undone; “Thou met’st, alas! a timeless doom, “Ere half thy course was run.

“Unhappy, self-admiring youth, “A lesson thou shalt prove; “T’ avoid vain pride, that idle toy, “And shun prepost’rous love.

“Fair when a boy, now chang’d, no more “Those beauties can’st thou boast; “But ever sadly may’st repent “In vain those beauties lost.

“View yonder Lily’s snowy pride, “Sprung from a seed divine; “Then own how much her beauty bright, “Fond flow’r, out-rivals thine!”

With modest grace the Lily bow’d The honours of her head; Then, with a sweet and modest grace, She thus instructive said:

“Well may they droop, to whom their fate, “With form divinely fair, “No other, better boon has giv’n “To make that beauty dear.

“For not this glossy white I bear, “Delight of human eyes; “Nor this so graceful form admir’d, “Are what I wish to prize.

“From heav’nly strain I first arose, “Emblem of chaste desires; “And still that chastity retain, “And check unhallow’d fires.

“No empty self-admirer, I “Would Folly’s trophies raise; “Such virtue then let all applaud, “Not empty beauty praise.”

She said; and strait the moral found Deep entrance in my breast; BEAUTY, if not with VIRTUE join’d, Is but an idle jest.