FABLE [28] XXVIII. The Persian, the Sun and the Cloud. John Gay Alexander Huber Editor Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford
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Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive
Taylor Institution Library St Giles' Oxford OX1 3NA UK info@eighteenthcenturypoetry.org https://www.eighteenthcenturypoetry.org/
Oxford This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. T13818 Gay, John, 1685-1732. FABLES. By Mr. GAY. London Printed for J. Tonson and J. Watts, MDCCXXVII. 1727 pp. 94-96. [14],173,[1]p.: ill.; 4°.

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FABLE [ 28 ] XXVIII . The Persian , the Sun and the Cloud . Is there a bard whom genius fires , Whose ev'ry thought the God inspires ? When Envy reads the nervous lines , She frets , she rails , she raves , she pines , Her hissing snakes with venom swell , She calls her venal train from hell , The servile fiends her nod obey , And all Curl's authors are in pay . Fame calls up calumny and spite . Thus shadow owes its birth to light . As prostrate to the God of day With heart devout a Persian lay ; His invocation thus begun . Parent of light , all-seeing Sun , Prolific beam , whose rays dispense The various gifts of Providence , Accept our praise , our daily prayer , Smile on our fields and bless the year . A Cloud , who mock'd his grateful tongue , The day with sudden darkness hung , With pride and envy swell'd , aloud A voice thus thunder'd from the cloud . Weak is this gawdy God of thine , Whom I at will forbid to shine ; Shall I nor vows , nor incense know ? Where praise is due the praise bestow . With fervent zeal the Persian mov'd Thus the proud calumny reprov'd . It was that God , who claims my prayer , Who gave thee birth and rais'd thee there : When o'er his beams the veil is thrown Thy substance is but plainer shown . A passing gale , a puff of wind Dispells thy thickest troops combin'd . The gale arose ; the vapor tost ( The sport of winds ) in air was lost ; The glorious orb the day refines . Thus Envy breaks , thus Merit shines .