[Footnote 2: _The French Revolution_ was suppressed at the time, and
has been recovered only in our own day by Dr. John Sampson, who first
published it in the admirable Clarendon Press edition of Blake.]




ENGLISH POETS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY




JOHN POMFRET


THE CHOICE

_If Heaven the grateful liberty would give,
That I might choose my method how to live;
And all those hours propitious fate should lend,
In blissful ease and satisfaction spend._

I. THE GENTLEMAN'S RETIREMENT

Near some fair town I'd have a private seat,
Built uniform, not little, nor too great:
Better, if on a rising ground it stood;
Fields on this side, on that a neighbouring wood.
It should within no other things contain,