Page:The Hundred Best Poems (lyrical) in the English language - second series.djvu/71

 A mistress moderately fair, And good as guardian-angels are, Only belov'd, and loving me!

Oh, fountains! when in you shall I Myself, eas'd of unpeaceful thoughts, espy? Oh fields! oh woods! when, when shall I be made The happy tenant of your shade? Here's the spring-head of Pleasure's flood; Where all the riches lie, that she Has coin'd and stamp'd for good.

Pride and ambition here Only in far-fetch'd metaphors appear; Here nought but winds can hurtful murmurs scatter, And nought but Echo flatter. The gods, when they descended, hither From Heaven did always choose their way; And therefore we may boldly say, That 'tis the way too thither.

How happy here should I, And one dear she, live, and embracing die! She, who is all the world, and can exclude In deserts solitude. I should have then this only fear— Lest men, when they my pleasures see, Should hither throng to live like me, And so make a city here.

1810 Edition.

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