html.skin-theme-clientpref-night @media(prefers-color-scheme:dark){html.skin-theme-clientpref-os }Home, Shepherds, to your Cottages retire,
Your Dorset Mourns; no more the Pipe inspire.
Your Mirth is done, your Care is vain; what need
To Tend those Flocks, that will no longer Feed?
}Nature her self concern'd for Him appears,
Sables for his and her lost Darling wears,
She Sighs in Storms, and Weeps in Seas of Tears.
Ev'n Earth that does the precious Relicks shroud,
Laments the Treasure that shou'd make her Proud:
Alone exempted from the gen'ral Care,
The Skies rejoyce to have regain'd their Star.
Profane Disease: The Crime had been too great,
In only Batt'ring of so fair a Seat!
Which spightfully thou quite hast undermin'd,
Because the bright Remains would still have shin'd:
So Envious Rome no Method cou'd employ
Fair Carthage to Subdue, but to Destroy.
Mute are the Groves, where Happy Shepherds sung,
And Philomel once more has lost her Tongue;
The Palm and Myrtle Glades no longer please:
Cypress and Yew are now the only Trees.
The ruthfull'st Objects, most Endearments have,
The Uncouth Vale Delights, and gloomy Cave
Can please, because it represents the Grave.
Tears our Refreshment are, our sole Relief,
To give Despair free scope,
To set the Sluces ope,
And Rowl with the Impetuous Tide of Grief.
Let the next Age the costly Tomb prepare,
To her shrin'd Image come, and seek her there;
The Present rears, beyond the Pow'r of Art,
A breathing Monument in ev'ry Heart.
What Rhet'rick can divorce, what Charms of Verse,
The Sighing Mother from her Darling's Hearse?
To trace her Features, and her Virtues paint,
In Form an Angel, as in Life a Saint;
Are Themes ill suited to a Parent's Grief,
The Food of Sorrow, an unkind Relief:
One only Sov'raign Balm sick Nature bears,
A Sympathizing Royal Mourners Tears:
Though Gods, nor Goddesses, may Fate reverse,
Our Goddess Weeping Consecrates the Hearse.
Behold, forlorn the Muses Patron laid,
With Mourning Cupids in the Cypress shade;
}Of Fate, nor cruel Skies, he once complains,
But inwardly the Conflict deep sustains,
The strugling Tumult in his Breast restrains.
O DORSET, cou'd our Worthless Live pretend
(Whose Comforts only on thy Smiles depend)
To Bribe thy Griefs, how pleas'd cou'd we resign
Our Breaths, compounding for one Pang of thine.
Our Useless Breaths are tender'd now in vain,
Since Tuneful Notes no more must chear the Plain,
Let Numbers cease; for whom shou'd they relieve,
That can no Comfort to their Patron give?
Yet, DORSET, Live, in pity to the Age,
That to Condole thy Loss forgets its Rage;
}The Impious Age still from one Crime is free,
Mad with Intestine Strife, we all agree,
As in Admiring in Lamenting Thee!
Let those dear Pledges Intercede at least,
The Living Relicks of the Fair Deceas'd;
Till Infant Beauty to full Bloom arrives,
The Mother's Virtues, and her Charms revives:
Till Dawning Buckhurst to his Zenith rise,
And gild (like you) and warm our Northern Skies.
Till then Indulge our dearest Wishes scope,
Next Age's DORSET, Britain's second Hope.