I.

“AH! hapless discontented flow’r,

“That yellow leaves adorn;

“Who once in life’s gay vernal pride

“The brightest nymphs could’st scorn.

II.

“Hard was thy lot, and short thy date,

“By form too fair undone;

“Thou met’st, alas! a timeless doom,

“Ere half thy course was run.

III.

“Unhappy, self-admiring youth,

“A lesson thou shalt prove;

“T’ avoid vain pride, that idle toy,

“And shun prepost’rous love.

IV.

“Fair when a boy, now chang’d, no more

“Those beauties can’st thou boast;

“But ever sadly may’st repent

“In vain those beauties lost.

V.

“View yonder Lily’s snowy pride,

“Sprung from a seed divine;

“Then own how much her beauty bright,

“Fond flow’r, out-rivals thine!”

VI.

With modest grace the Lily bow’d

The honours of her head;

Then, with a sweet and modest grace,

She thus instructive said:

VII.

“Well may they droop, to whom their fate,

“With form divinely fair,

“No other, better boon has giv’n

“To make that beauty dear.

VIII.

“For not this glossy white I bear,

“Delight of human eyes;

“Nor this so graceful form admir’d,

“Are what I wish to prize.

IX.

“From heav’nly strain[16] I first arose,

“Emblem of chaste desires;

“And still that chastity retain,

“And check unhallow’d fires.

X.

“No empty self-admirer, I

“Would Folly’s trophies raise;

“Such virtue then let all applaud,

“Not empty beauty praise.”

XI.

She said; and strait the moral found

Deep entrance in my breast;

Beauty, if not with Virtue join’d,

Is but an idle jest.