The Orator Of The Woods[35]

Each traveller asks, with fond surprize, Why Thyrsis wastes the fleeting year Where gloomy forests round him rise, And only rustics come to hear-- His taste is odd (they seem to say) Such talents in so poor a way!

To those that courts and titles please How dismal is his lot; Beyond the hills, beneath some trees, To live--and be forgot-- In dull retreats, where Nature binds Her mass of clay to vulgar minds.

While you lament his barren trade, Tell me--in yonder vale Why grows that flower beneath the shade, So feeble and so pale!-- Why was she not in sun-shine placed To blush and please your men of taste?

In lonely wilds, those flowers so fair No curious step allure; And chance, not choice, has placed them there, (Still charming, tho' obscure) Where, heedless of such sweets so nigh, The lazy hind goes loitering by.

Published in the Daily Advertiser, June 29, 1790, with the explanation: "Occasioned by hearing a very elegant Discourse preached in a mean Building, by the Parson of an obscure Parrish." Text from the 1809 edition.