Classic Poem

On being introduced to a Gentleman, who had laboured under an Affliction sixteen Years.

Why mourns my soul thy cureless woe;
Why heaves my vain unwilling sigh;
Why should my tear of anguish flow
For thee , whom Joy must ever fly?

I see thee struggle to conceal
The inward pang with watchful care.
Ah, well thou know'st how few can feel,
How few dear sympathy can share.

Yet shall thy calmness teach my soul
Silent to bear her lot of pain;
And when tumultuous passions roll,
Or latent Grief more deeply reigns,

I'll think on thee, lamented youth,
With thine compare each trivial ill;
Like thee repose on sacred Truth,
And with thee own an heav'nly will.

What less supports thee? — What the boast
Of hoary self-denying Sage,
To all but stoic wisdom lost,
He vainly fills the study'd page.

His stubborn soul resists the plea
Of Mis'ry when she owns her God:
Checking with pride the bending knee,
He feels, yet scorns th' uplifted rod.

Hence, stern Philosophy! — or turn
And see how Patience owns thy guise:
Here view a victim, taught to mourn,
Ere thy rough precept made him wise.

Then hush thy sounds of classic lore,
Where demonstrations seldom join;
Religion boasts a stronger pow'r,
Proving her ardours all divine.

When rack'd with pain, thro' tedious nights,
The frame no balmy comfort shares;
Estrang'd from ease, or soft delights,
We wake to nurse a brood of cares:

Much do we need a pitying friend,
To sooth and share distracted thought;
In whose soft breast the virtues blend,
To fill the sympathetic draught.

Ah! wish too vain — yet ever new,
For where resides the equal mind?
Ye sons of woe, I ask of you,
Where shall the wretch this comfort find?

Each born to bear his load of ill,
He weakly dares the surge of Fate;
Time swiftly does Life's journal fill,
And trembling Sorrow seals his date.

Then where's the bulwark of the soul,
When close besieg'd by troops of woe;
Who shall her horrid band controul,
Or turn aside the destin'd blow?

Exulting Faith! Heav'n's strongest child,
Shall, in her arms, thy spirit bear;
While soothing Hope, with accent mild,
First chides, then dries the fruitless tear.

Yet calmly suffer — quickly flies
Time's shuttle on, for thee and me.
Reflect: like us the monarch dies:
Like him we share Heav'ns grand decree.