OF TEMPER.
75
Soul-chilling damps in the dark passage reign,
Which issues on a vast and dreary plain,
Fann'd by no breezes, with no verdure crown'd;
The black horizon is its only bound.
And now advancing, in a drizzly mist,
Thro' sullen phantoms, hating to exist,
Serena spies, high o'er his subjects plac'd.
The ghastly tyrant of the gloomy waste.
Murmuring he sits upon a rocking stone,
Th' unstable base of his ill-founded throne:
Hideous his face, and horrible his frame,
Misanthropy the grisly monster's name!
Him to fierce Pride, with raging passion sore,
The frowning gorgon, Disappointment, bore;
On earth detested, and by heaven abhorr'd,
Of this drear wild he reigns the moody lord.
Few are the subjects of his waste domain,
And scarce a female in his frightful train,
Except one changing corps of ancient prudes:
Reluctant here the prying band intrudes.
Which issues on a vast and dreary plain,
Fann'd by no breezes, with no verdure crown'd;
The black horizon is its only bound.
And now advancing, in a drizzly mist,
Thro' sullen phantoms, hating to exist,
Serena spies, high o'er his subjects plac'd.
The ghastly tyrant of the gloomy waste.
Murmuring he sits upon a rocking stone,
Th' unstable base of his ill-founded throne:
Hideous his face, and horrible his frame,
Misanthropy the grisly monster's name!
Him to fierce Pride, with raging passion sore,
The frowning gorgon, Disappointment, bore;
On earth detested, and by heaven abhorr'd,
Of this drear wild he reigns the moody lord.
Few are the subjects of his waste domain,
And scarce a female in his frightful train,
Except one changing corps of ancient prudes:
Reluctant here the prying band intrudes.
