Page:The Art of Preserving Health - A Poem in Four Books.djvu/56

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 * O comfortable streams! With eager lips

And trembling hand the languid thirsty quaff New life in you; fresh vigor fills their veins. No warmer cups the rural ages knew; None warmer fought the fires of human-kind. Happy in temperate peace! Their equal days Felt not th' alternate fits of feverish mirth, And sick dejection. Still serene and pleas'd, They knew no pains but what the tender soul With pleasure yields to, and would ne'er forget. Blest with divine immunity from ails, Long centuries they liv'd; their only fate Was ripe old age, and rather sleep than death. Oh! could those worthies from the world of Gods Return to visit their degenerate sons, How would they scorn the joys of modern time, With all our art and toil improv'd to pain! Rh