Page:Poems of Anne Countess of Winchilsea 1903.djvu/300

162 THE POEMS OP ANNE �Or abandoning the Place, 50 �No Return my Nature bears, From green Youth, or hoary Hairs ; If thro' Guilt, or Chance, I sever, I once Parting, Part for ever. �THE KING AND THE SHEPHERD Imitated from the French �Through ev'ry Age some Tyrant Passion reigns: �Now Love prevails, and now Ambition gains �Reason's lost Throne, and sov'reign Rule maintains. �Tho' beyond Love's, Ambition's Empire goes; �For who feels Love, Ambition also knows, �And proudly still aspires to be possest �Of Her, he thinks superior to the rest. �As cou'd be prov'd, but that our plainer Task �Do's no such Toil, or Definitions ask; �But to be so rehears'd, as first 'twas told, 10 �When such old Stories pleas'd in Days of old. �A King, observing how a Shepherd^ Skill Improv'd his Flocks, and did the Pastures fill, That equal Care th' assaulted did defend, And the secur'd and grazing Part attend, Approves the Conduct, and from Sheep and Curs Transfers the Sway, and changed his Wool to Furrs. �Lord-Keeper now, as rightly he divides �His just Decrees, and speedily decides; �When his sole Neighbour, whilst he watch'd the Fold, �A Hermit poor, in Contemplation old, 21 �Hastes to his Ear, with safe, but lost Advice, �Tells him such Heights are levell'd in a trice, �Preferments treach'rous, and her Paths of Ice: ��� �