Poem by Mary Wortley Montagu

Verses Written in a Garden

See how the pair of billing doves
With open murmurs own their loves;
And, heedless of censorious eyes,
Pursue their unpolluted joys;
No fears of future want molest
The downy quiet of their nest:
No int'rest join'd the happy pair,
Securely blest in Nature's care,
While her dictates they pursue;
For constancy is Nature too.
Can all the doctrine of the schools,
Our maxims, our religious rules,
Can learning to our lives ensure,
Virtue so bright, or bliss so pure?

1. The Fourth Ode of the First Book of Horace Imitated
2. Epigram, 1734
3. Town Eclogues: Wednesday; the Tête à Tête
4. Addressed to ------, 1736
5. Ballad, on a Late Occurrence

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