Page:The Pleasures of Imagination - Akenside (1744).djvu/38

24 And active motion speaks the temper'd soul: So moves the bird of Juno; so the steed With rival ardour beats the dusty plain, And faithful dogs with eager airs of joy Salute their fellows. Thus doth beauty dwell There most conspicuous, ev'n in outward shape, Where dawns the high expression of a mind: By steps conducting our inraptur'd search To that eternal origin, whose pow'r, Thro' all th' unbounded symmetry of things, Like rays effulging from the parent sun, This endless mixture of her charms diffus'd. alone, bear witness, earth and heav'n! The living fountain in itself contains Of beauteous and sublime: here, hand in hand, Sit paramount the Graces; here inthron'd, Cœlestial Venus, with divinest airs, Invites the soul to never-fading joy. Look then abroad thro' nature, to the range Of planets, suns, and adamantine spheres Wheeling unshaken thro' the void immense; And speak, O man! does this capacious scene With half that kindling majesty dilate Thy strong conception, as when Brutus rose Resul-