LIBERAL OPINIONS, &c, ODE

Hail to the harmless seats of happy youth! To the smooth hours of genuine pleasure, hail! Hail to transport—hail to truth, When jocund health blew fresh in ev'ry gale, And reckless pastime spread the frolic sail!— Backwards, dear Youth—a little cast thine eye, Let pregnant Fancy paint each early scene, And pencil fair our boyish days, The lively hope that crown'd the revel reign: Our thousand pleasures—thousand plays!— If these thou hast forgot—forbear to sigh: But if thou call'st to mind—bestow thy sympathy. Recall the hour that set us free From gerunds, pronouns, prosody, Recall the bliss that throbb'd the heart, When the glad summons bade us freely start, 'Twas heaven, and holiday— And ev'ry little soul was in its May!

'Tis true, we dealt in trifles then, But trifles catch more mighty men; Cheap were the baby-toys we chose, Blithe as the ruddy morn we rose, And slept at night, with—all a boy's repose. We knew not man's amusements wild, Our wishes were the wishes of a child.

What tho' (for we are heirs of pain, Even from cradle, sore we sigh, And as the hill of life we gain, More rugged is the road—more sharp the misery).

What tho' some vexing troubles chose Our sports to discompose; What tho' the lightning of the master's eye, The threat'ning tone, the brow austere, Bespoke disaster near, And pedagogal tyranny: Tho' knotty points of learned lore distrest, Puzzled the head, and throbb'd the breast; Tho' the keen scourge—of dreadful size! Acutely whipp'd to make us wise; The fleeting anguish never reach'd the heart, But the faint cries were transient as the smart.

Soon as the sense of pain was o'er, Suspended happiness return'd, The passing tear was seen, no more. The birchen sceptre lost its power, For mirth resum'd the vacant hour, And the gay stripling laughs at what he mourn'd!

The soldier thus, in heat of wars, Sunk by the sudden blow to ground, Still cover'd o'er with various scars, E'er well the anguish leaves the wound, Soon as he gains the strand That girds his native land, With triumph he recounts the hardy fray, Shews the deep mark, where many a bare bone lay; And smiles at all the blood-shed of the day.

Can'st thou, my friend, recall these joys, Yet cease to wish we still were boys Think on the deep complottings of our crew, Scheme upon scheme, some arch exploir in view, The merry moonshine-pranks we play'd, The little thefts at evening's fall; The truant rambles we advent'rous made, When bold we scal'd the orchard wall. Where as we reach the ruddy bough, On which the fair temptations grow, One plucks the fruit,—and one receives below! Ah miniature exact of man! Nature's full-length, is still on childhood's plan. But brighter colours deck the youth, Rapture and health, vivacity and truth, Soft too are then the shades of care, And art wants time to paint The figures of despair!