Part ff. 70–75 - ‘Matilda | an Elegy’ (author unknown)

1 entry

First line: ‘Patient, ye heav’ns, I bow to your decree!’.

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Transcript

Matilda | an Elegy

“Patient, {1} ye heav’ns, I bow to your decree!”
The fair Matilda cried, opprest with woe;
“In {2} dread submission bend the lowly knee,
And venerate the hand that strikes the blow!

Yet may I still indulge without a crime,
My sorrows for my much lov’d parent’s fate;
A Father’s temples grey before their time,
A mother sinking with misfortune’s weight!

Yet may I still for them some aid implore,?
Nor check the tear that struggles in my eye;
To see them wander faint from door to door,
No roof to shield them from the troubled sky!

If the fierce tempest beat on me alone,
(O! that such grace my earnest prayers could win.)
I’d meet with smiles misfortune’s blackest frown,
While my soul breath’d tranquillity within.

It was not always thus!—once fortune smil’d,
I thought her partial favours ne’er would end;
Peace seem’d to mark me for her fav’rite child,
And universal nature seem’d my friend.

The poor man blest me as I past him by,
Secure to meet with succour at my gate;
The rich beheld me with a fav’ring Eye,
I shar’d their friendship, while I shar’d their fate.

Wheree’er I trod, while riches gave me charms,
I saw a thousand lovers round me kneel,
All long’d to clasp such beauty in their arms,
And feign’d the transport which they did not feell†.

I scorn’d their sordid minds. but soon appear’d
A youth;—O! heavens! that such a youth could be;
All prais’d! and more my raptur’d soul {2} was cheer’d,
Than if the praises were bestow’d on me.!

Each place was desert, when he was not there;
The crouded Ballroom, or the peaceful mead;
I knew no bliss which Henry did not share,
And when he shar’d it, ’twas a bliss indeed.!

T’was all a dream, and soon that dream was past,
O! what a change my sould was doom’d to prove!
To pain, to penury, I woke at last,
To alter’d friendship, and to slighted love.!

For fortune all her former smiles withdrew;
And friendship led, where fortune wing’d her flight;
Loves garb aside the Demon Av’rice threw,
And all his native foulness shock’d my sight.

This I had born, and born without a tear,
Had met my own sad fate with dauntless view;
But O! my parents’ {3} woes I cannot bear,
These all my boasted fortitude subdue!”

She spoke; the muse oer heard the mournful tale; {4}
Her bright eye glistend with compassion’s tear;
“Sweet maid.!” she cried,! “at {5} length your prayers prevail,
A Daughter’s piety has reach’d my ear.

My wing shall guard thee from the tempest’s rage,
(As much as muse’s feeble wing can guard)
My wing shall shield thy {6} parents’ {3} helpless age,
And all a daughter’s tenderness reward.!

Be mine to bid thy breast it’s sighs forego,
The tears of anguish from thy cheek to dry,
To raise thine eye above these scenes of woe,
To fairer regions, and a brighter Sky.!”

Check her not, Criticks, in her fond career!
For thou her lays may want the touch of art,
Tho’ with harsh discord she may grate your ear,
O! let her gentle purpose melt your heart.!

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The spacing and indentation of the lines are irregular and it is unclear what scheme was intended. The indentation of the MS has not been reproduced. The arrangement into stanzas above is conjectural.

{1} The opening inverted commas have been supplied.

{2} Written above ‘age’, struck through.

{3} Or ‘parent’s’.

{4} Semi-colon supplied.

{5} The intended arrangement of the punctuation marks before this word is unclear.

{6} Altered imperfectly from ‘they’.

† Sic.

Printed, under the heading ‘For the New Scots Spy. Verses. By a Gentlemen [sic] to his Lady, with a present of a Knife’, in The New Scots Spy, 29 Aug. 1777, p. 31. Reprinted in other journals and miscellanies, including The New Foundling Hospital of Wit (1784 ed.), vol. v, p. 31–2 (cf. ff. 15r–17r above), and, under the title ‘To Mrs. Bishop, with a Present of a Knife’, in The Poetical Works of the Rev. Samuel Bishop, A.M. (1796), vol. ii, pp. 16–18.

This description was created by A. C. Green in 2025.