Page:The Pleasures of Imagination - Akenside (1744).djvu/35

Book I. Did fancy mock your vows. Nor let the gleam Of youthful hope that shines upon your Hearts, Be chill'd or clouded at this awful task To learn the lore of undeceitful good, And truth eternal. Tho' the pois'nous charms Of baleful superstition, guide the feet Of servile numbers, thro' a dreary way To their abode, thro' desarts, thorns and mire; And leave the wretched pilgrim all forlorn To muse, at last, amid the ghostly gloom Of graves, and hoary vaults, and cloister'd cells; To walk with spectres thro' the midnight shade, And to the screaming owl's accursed song Attune the dreadful workings of his heart; Yet be not you dismay'd. A gentler star Your lovely search illumines. From the grove Where wisdom talk'd with her Athenian sons, Could my ambitious hand intwine a wreath Of Author:Plato olive with the Mantuan bay, Then should my pow'rful verse at once dispel Those monkish horrors: then in light divine Disclose th' Elysian prospect, where the steps Of those whom nature charms, thro' blooming walks, Thro' fragrant mountains and poetic streams, Amid the train of sages, heroes, bards, Led by their winged Genius and the choir Of laurell'd science and harmonious art, Pro-