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    In such a night, when every louder wind
    Is to its distant cavern safe confined;
    And only gentle Zephyr fans his wings,
    And lonely Philomel, still waking, sings;
    Or from some tree, famed for the owl’s delight,
    She, hollowing clear, directs the wand’rer right:
    In such a night, when passing clouds give place,
    Or thinly veil the heav’ns’ mysterious face;
    When in some river, overhung with green,
    The waving moon and trembling leaves are seen;
    When freshened grass now bears itself upright,
    And makes cool banks to pleasing rest invite,
    Whence springs the woodbind, and the bramble-rose,
    And where the sleepy cowslip sheltered grows;
    Whilst now a paler hue the foxglove takes,
    Yet checkers still with red the dusky brakes
    When scattered glow-worms, but in twilight fine,
    Shew trivial beauties watch their hour to shine;
    Whilst Salisb’ry stands the test of every light,
    In perfect charms, and perfect virtue bright:
    When odors, which declined repelling day,
    Through temp’rate air uninterrupted stray;
    When darkened groves their softest shadows wear,
    And falling waters we distinctly hear;
    When through the gloom more venerable shows
    Some ancient fabric, awful in repose,
    While sunburnt hills their swarthy looks conceal,
    And swelling haycocks thicken up the vale:
    When the loosed horse now, as his pasture leads,
    Comes slowly grazing through th’ adjoining meads,
    Whose stealing pace, and lengthened shade we fear,
    Till torn-up forage in his teeth we hear:
    When nibbling sheep at large pursue their food,
    And unmolested kine rechew the cud;
    When curlews cry beneath the village walls,
    And to her straggling brood the partridge calls;
    Their shortlived jubilee the creatures keep,
    Which but endures, whilst tyrant man does sleep;
    When a sedate content the spirit feels,
    And no fierce light disturbs, whilst it reveals;
    But silent musings urge the mind to seek
    Something, too high for syllables to speak;
    Till the free soul to a composedness charmed,
    Finding the elements of rage disarmed,
    O’er all below a solemn quiet grown,
    Joys in th’ inferior world, and thinks it like her own:
    In such a night let me abroad remain,
    Till morning breaks, and all’s confused again;
    Our cares, our toils, our clamors are renewed,
    Or pleasures, seldom reached, again pursued.

    By Anne Finch

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