Nor let me with a vain and idle eye
Glance o'er those scenes, and in a hurry fly
Quick as a Post which travels day and night,
Nor let me dwell there, lur'd by false delight,
And, into barren theory betray'd,
Forget that Monarchs are for action made.
When am'rous SPRING, repairing all his charms,
Calls Nature forth from hoary Winter's arms,
Where, like a Virgin to some letcher sold,
Three wretched months, she lay benumb'd, and cold;
When the weak Flow'r, which, shrinking from the breath
Of the rude North, and, timorous of Death,
To its kind Mother Earth for shelter fled,
And on her bosom hid its tender head,
Peeps forth afresh, and, chear'd by milder skies,
Bids in full splendour all her beauties rise;
The Hive is up in arms — expert to teach,
Nor, proudly, to be taught unwilling, each
Seems from her fellow a new zeal to catch;
Strength in her limbs, and on her wings dispatch,
The BEE goes forth; from herb to herb she flies,
From Flow'r to Flow'r, and loads her lab'ring thighs
With treasur'd sweets, robbing those Flow'rs, which left,
Find not themselves made poorer by the theft,
Their scents as lively, and their looks as fair,
As if the pillager had not been there.
Ne'er doth she flit on Pleasure's silken Wing,
Ne'er doth she, loit'ring, let the bloom of Spring
Unrifled pass, and on the downy breast
Of some fair Flow'r indulge untimely rest.
Ne'er doth she, drinking deep of those rich dews
Which Chymist Night prepar'd, that faith abuse
Due to the hive, and, selfish in her toils,
To her own private use convert the spoils.
Love of the Stock first call'd her forth to roam,
And to the Stock she brings her booty Home.