Advice To A Young Female Poem by Christian Milne

YOU ask my counsel how you ought to live;
Unfit am I the needful rules to give
For female conduct, which requires much art,
To guard and fortify the female heart
Against seducers, who, with guileful tongue,
Delight to ruin and ensnare the young!
The poor and credulous Vice marks as prey;
With baits it lures them out of Virtue's way.
Thus gay apparel and alluring coin
Make females break thro' ev'ry law divine;
They shun reflection, and they scorn advice,
Buying their pleasures at a deadly price;
While souls immortal, and their bodies frail,
They give for baubles that must instant fail.
Not so the Maid who makes her early care
To court Religion with a mind sincere;
If Vice invite her, she disgusted turns--
'Gainst base seducers her resentment burns;
Nor gold, nor grandeur, can persuade to stray,
Whom GOD supports in vile temptations day.
With pure affection she regards the Youth
Who walks with Virtue in the paths of Truth!
Age creeps on happy, as their offspring rise--
She lives respected, and regretted dies.
What's Youth and Beauty? But a passing flow'r,
More short and transient than the fleeting show'r;
Old age and sickness lay its honours waste;
But Virtue's beauties will for ever last.