[Tea-Table Miscellany Contents]
To the Tune of, Valiant Jocky.
–
On a beautiful, but very young Lady.
–
BEauty from fancy takes its arms,
And ev’ry common face some breast may move,
Some in a look, a shape or air find charms,
To justify their choice, or boast their love.
But had the great Apelles seen that face,
When he the Cyprian goddess drew,
He had neglected all the female race,
Thrown his first Venus by, and copied you.
In that design,
Great nature would combine
To fix the standart of her sacred coin;
The charming figure had enhanc’d his fame,
And shrines been rais’d to Seraphina’s name.
–
II.
But since no painter e’er could take
That face which baffles all his curious Art;
And he that strives the bold attempt to make,
As well might paint the secrets of the heart.
O happy glass, I’ll thee prefer,
Content to be like thee inanimate,
Since only to be gaz’d on thus by her,
A better life and motion would create.
Her eyes would inspire,
And like Prometheus’ fire,
At once inform the piece and give desire,
The charming phantom I would grasp, and flie
O’er all the orb, though in that moment die.
–
III.
Let meaner beauties fear the day,
Whose charms are fading, and submit to time;
The graces which from them it steals away,
It with a lavish hand still adds to thine.
The God of love in ambush lies,
And with his arm surrounds the fair,
He points his conquering arrows in these eyes,
Then hangs a sharpned dart at every hair.
As with fatal skill,
Turn which way you will,
Like Eden’s flaming sword each way you kill;
So ripening years improve rich nature’s store,
And gives perfection to the golden ore.
– New Words by Different Hands.