Page:The works of Anna Laetitia Barbauld volume 1.djvu/132

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
48
CHARACTERS.


Wealth may be courted, Wisdom be revered,
And Beauty praised, and brutal Strength be feared
But Goodness only can affection move,
And love must owe its origin to love.


Illam quicquid agit, quoquo vestigia flectit,
Componit furtim, subsequiturque decor.

Tibul.

Of gentle manners, and of taste refined;
With all the graces of a polished mind;
Clear sense and truth still shone in all she spoke,
And from her lips no idle sentence broke.
Each nicer elegance of art she knew;
Correctly fair, and regularly true.
Her ready fingers plied with equal skill
The pencil's task, the needle, or the quill;
So poised her feelings, so composed her soul,
So subject all to reason's calm controul,—