OF TEMPER.
77
When in unseemly rags they have array'd
The image, from their own dark semblance made,
In horrid gambols round their work they throng,
With antic dance and rude dicordant song;
Satire's rank offals on the block they fling,
And call it nature, to delight their king:
While in their features he exults to see
The frowns of torture, mixt with grins of glee.
For, as these abject toils engage the crew,
Their own grim idol darkens to their view;
Wide and more wide its horrid stature spreads,
And o'er the tribe new confirmation sheds:
For each forgets, in his bewilder'd gaze,
'Tis but a monster, which he help'd to raise.
As o'er its form their dizzy glances roll,
It strikes a cheerless damp thro' all the soul.
Vainly to shun the baleful sight they try,
It draws for ever the reluctant eye:
At each review with deeper dread they start;
A colder chaos numbs each freezing heart.
The image, from their own dark semblance made,
In horrid gambols round their work they throng,
With antic dance and rude dicordant song;
Satire's rank offals on the block they fling,
And call it nature, to delight their king:
While in their features he exults to see
The frowns of torture, mixt with grins of glee.
For, as these abject toils engage the crew,
Their own grim idol darkens to their view;
Wide and more wide its horrid stature spreads,
And o'er the tribe new confirmation sheds:
For each forgets, in his bewilder'd gaze,
'Tis but a monster, which he help'd to raise.
As o'er its form their dizzy glances roll,
It strikes a cheerless damp thro' all the soul.
Vainly to shun the baleful sight they try,
It draws for ever the reluctant eye:
At each review with deeper dread they start;
A colder chaos numbs each freezing heart.
