Lets go its eager grasp, and drops the world;
And catches at each reed of hope in heav'n.
Already is begun the grand assize,
In us, in all: deputed conscience scales
The dread tribunal, and forestalls our doom;
Forestalls; and by forestalling, proves it sure.
Why on himself should man void judgement
Is idle nature laughing at her sons ? [pass?
Who conscience sent, her sentence will support,
And God above assert that God in man.

$245. Thoughtlessness of the last Day.
THRICE happy they, that enter now the court
Heav'n opens in their bosoms: but, how rare!
Ah me! that magnanimity, how rare!
What hero, like the man who stands himself;
Who dares to meet his naked heart alone?
Who hears intrepid the full charge it brings,
Resolv'd to silence future murmurs there?
The coward flies; and, flying, is undone.

Shall all, but man, look out with ardent eye,
For that great day, which was ordain'd for man?
O day of consummation! mark supreme
(If men are wise) of human thought! nor least,
Or in the sight of angels, or their King!
Angels, whose radiant circles, height o'er height,
As in a theatre, surround this scene,
Intent on man and anxious for his fate,
Angels look out for thee; for thee, their Lord,
To vindicate his glory; and for thee,
Creation universal calls aloud,

To disinvolve the moral world, and give
To nature's renovation brighter charms.

Shall man alone, whose fate, whose final fate,
Hangs on that hour, exclude it from his thought?
I think of nothing else; I see! I feel it!
All nature, like an earthquake, trembling round!
I see the Judge enthron'd! the flaming guard!
The volume open'd! open'd ev'ry heart!

A sun-beam pointing out each secret thought!
No patron! intercessor none! now past
The sweet, the element, mediatorial hour!
For guilt no plea! to pain no pause! no bound!
Inexorable, all! and all extreme!
Nor man alone; the foe of God and man,
From his dark den, blaspheming, drags his chain,
And rears his brazen front, with thunder scar'd;
Like meteors in a stormy sky, how roll
His baleful eyes! he curses whom he dreads,
And deems it the first moment of his fall.

§ 246. Eternity and Time.

'Tis present to my thought !—And, yet, where is it?

Say, Thou great close of human hopes and fears!
Great key of hearts! great finisher of fates!
Great end, and great beginning! say, where art
Art thou in time, or in eternity? [Thou?
Nor in eternity, nor time, I find thee!
These, as two monarchs, on their borders meet,
(Monarchs of all elaps'd, or un-arriv'd!)
As in debate, how best their pow'rs ally'd
May swell the grandeur, or discharge the wrath,
Of him, whom both their monarchies obey.

Time, this vast fabric for him built (and

doom'd

With him to fall) now bursting o'er his head ;
His lamp, the sun, extinguish'd, cails his sons
From their long slumber, from earth's heaving
womb,

To second birth; upstarting from one bed,
He turns them o'er, eternity! to thee:
Then (as a king depos'd disdains to live)
He falls on his own scythe; nor falls alone;
His greatest foe falls with him; time, and he
Who murder'd all time's offspring, death, expire.
Time was! eternity now reigns alone!
And lo! her twice ten thousand gates thrown
wide,

With banners, streaming as the comet's blaze,
And clarions, louder than the deep in storms,
Pour forth their myriads, potentates, and pow'rs,
Of light, of darkness: in a middle field,
Wide as creation! there to mark th' event
Of that great drama, whose preceding scenes
Detain'd them close spectators, through a length
Of ages, rip'ning to this grand result;
Ages, as yet unnumber'd but by God;
Who, now, pronouncing sentence, vindicates
The rights of virtue, and his own renown.

Eternity, the various sentence past,
Assigns the sever'd throng distinct abodes,
Sulphureous or ambrosial: What ensues?
The goddess, with determin'd aspect, turns
Her adamantine key's enormous size
Through destiny's inextricable wards,
Deep-driving ev'ry bolt, on both their fates:
Then from the crystal battlements of heav'n,
Down, down, she hurls it through the dark pro-
found,

Ten thousand thousand fathom; there to rust,
And ne'er unlock her resolution more.
The deep resounds, and hell, through all her
glooms,

Returns, in groans, the melancholy roar.

§ 247. The Unreasonableness of Complaint. WHAT then am I?—

Amidst applauding worlds,
And worlds celestial, is there found on earth
A peevish, dissonant, rebellious string,
Which jars in the grand chorus, and complains?
All, all is right, by God ordain'd, or done;
And who, but God, resum'd the friends he gave?
And have I been complaining, then, so long?-
Complaining of his favours; pain, and death?
Who without pain's advice would e'er be good?
Who without death, but would be good in vain?
Pain is to save from pain! all punishment,
To make for peace! and death to save from
death!

And second death to guard immortal life;
To rouse the careless, the presumptuous awe,
And turn the tide of souls another way;
By the same tenderness divine ordain'd,
That planted Eden, and high-bloom'd for man,
A fairer Eden, endless in the skies.

$248. Grief and Joy.
LET impious grief be banish'd, joy indulg'd;
But chiefly then, when grief puts in her claim:
Joy from the joyous frequently betrays,
Oft lives in vanity, and dies in woe:
Joy amidst ills, corroborates, exalts;
'Tis joy and conquest: joy, and virtue too:
A noble fortitude in ills delights

Heav'n, earth, ourselves; 'tis duty, glory, peace.
Affliction is the good man's shining scene;
Prosperity conceals his brightest ray:
As night to stars, woe lustre gives to man:
Heroes in battle, pilots in the storm,
And virtue in calamities, admire.
The crown of manhood is a winter joy;

An ever-green, that stands the northern blast,
And blossoms in the rigor of our fate.

§ 249. Night.

--O MAJESTIC Night!

Nature's great ancestor! day's elder-born!
And fated to survive the transient sun!
A starry cloud thy raven-brow adorns, [loom,
An azure zone, thy waist; clouds, in heav'n's
Wrought through varieties of shape and shade,
In ample folds of drapery divine, [out,
Thy flowing mantle form, and, heav'n through-
Voluminously pour thy pompous train:
Thy gloomy grandeurs claim a grateful verse,
And, like a sable curtain starr'd with gold,
Drawn o'er my labors past, shall close the scene.

§ 250. Regularity of the Heavenly Bodies.
NOR think thou seest a wild disorder here;
Through this illustrious chaos, to the sight,
Arrangement neat, the chastest order, reign.
The path prescrib'd, inviolably kept,
Upbraids the lawless sallies of mankind:
Worlds, ever thwarting, never interfere ;
They rove for ever, without error rove:
Confusion unconfus'd! nor less admire
This tumult untumultuous; all on wing,
In motion, all! yet what profound repose!
What fervid action, yet no noise! as aw'd
To silence by the presence of their Lord;
Or hush'd, by his command, in love to man,
And bid let fall soft beams on human rest,
Restless themselves. On yon cerulean plain,
In exultation to their God and thine,
They dance, they sing eternal jubilee,
Eternal celebration of his praise:
But since their song arrives not at our ear,
Their dance perplex'd exhibits to the sight
Fair hieroglyphic of his peerless power:
Mark, how the labyrinthian turns they take,
The circles intricate, and mystic maze,
Weave the grand cipher of Omnipotence;
To Gods how great! how legible to man!
$251. Miracles.

AND yet Lorenzo calls for miracles,
To give his tott'ring faith a solid base:
Why call for less than is already thine?

Say, which imports more plenitude of power,
Or nature's laws to fix, or to repeal?
To make a sun, or stop his mid-career?

To countermand his orders, and send back
The flaming courier to the frighted east,
Or bid the moon, as with her journey tir'd,
In Ajalon's soft, flow'ry vale repose?
Great things are these; still greater, to create.
From Adam's bow'r look down through the
whole train

Of miracles ;-resistless is their pow'r?
They do not, cannot, more amaze the mind,
Than this, call'd un-miraculous survey
Say'st thou, "The course of nature governs
The course of nature is the art of God: [all ?"
The miracles thou call'st for, this attest;
For, say, could nature nature's course control?

§ 252. Nature the Foe of Scepticism.
OPEN thy bosom, set thy wishes wide,
And let in manhood; let in happiness;
Admit the boundless theatre of thought
From nothing up to God; which makes a man:
Take God from nature, nothing great is left:
Man's mind is in a pit, and nothing sees:
Emerge from thy profound; erect thine eye;
Besieg'd by nature, the proud sceptic's foe!
See thy distress! how close art thou besieg'd?
Inclos'd by these innumerable worlds,
Sparkling conviction on the darkest mind,
How art thou caught! sure captive of belief!
As in a golden net of providence,
From this thy blest captivity, what art,
What blasphemy to reason sets thee free?
This scene is heaven's indulgent violence:
Canst thou bear up against the tide of glory?
What is earth bosom'd in the ambient orbs,
But faith in God impos'd, and press'd on man?
God is a spirit; spirit cannot strike
These gross, material organs; God by man
As much is seen, as man a God can see
In these astonishing exploits of power:
What order, beauty, motion, distance, size!
Apt means! great ends! consent to general good!
Each attribute of these material gods
A separate conquest gains o'er rebel thought;
And leads in triumph the whole mind of man.

$253. Reasons for Belief. "WHAT am I? and from whence?-1 nothing know,

But that I am; and, since I am, conclude
Something eternal: had there e'er been nought,
Nought still had been: eternal there must be:
But what eternal ?-Why not human race;
And Adam's ancestors without an end?
That's hard to be conceiv'd; since every link
Of that long-chain'd succession is so frail;
Can every part depend, and not the whole?
Yet grant it true; new difficulties rise; [too?
Whence earth, and these bright orbs ?-eternal
Grant matter was eternal; still these orbs
Would want some other father :-much design
Is seen in all their motions, all their makes:

Thou know'st; for thou art near him; by thee,
His grand pavilion, sacred fame reports, [round
The sable curtain's drawn, if not, can none
Of thy fair daughter-train, so swift of wing,
Who travel far, discover where he dwells?
A star his dwelling pointed out below:
Say, ye, who guide the wilder'd in the waves,
On which hand must I bend my course to find
him?

These courtiers keep the secret of their king;
I wake whole nights, in vain, to steal it from
In ardent contemplation's rapid car, [them.
From earth, as from my barrier, I set out:
How swift I mount; diminish'd earth recedes;
pass the moon; and, from her farther side,
Pierce heaven's blue curtain; pause at every
planet,

I

And ask for him, who gives their orbs to roll.
From Saturn's ring, I take my bolder flight,
Amid those sovereign glories of the skies,
Of independent, native lustre, proud,
The souls of system!-What behold I now?
A wilderness of wonders burning round
Where larger suns inherit higher spheres;
Nor halt I here; my toil is but begun;
"Tis but the threshold of the Deity;
Or, far beneath it, I am grovelling still.

;

§ 256. Man's Science the Culture of his Heart.
'Tis not the curious, but the pious path,
That leads me to my point: Lorenzo! know,
Without or star or angel for their guide,
Who worship God, shall find him: humble
love,

And not proud reason, keeps the door of heaven;
Love finds admission, where proud science fails.
Man's science is the culture of his heart;
And not to lose his plummet in the depths
Of nature, or the more profound of God:
To fathom nature (ill attempted here!),
Past doubt, is deep philosophy above;
Higher degrees in bliss archangels take,
As deeper learn'd; the deepest, learning still:
For, what a thunder of omnipotence
Is seen in all! in man! in earth! in skies!
Teaching this lesson, pride is loth to learn-
"Not deeply to discern, not much to know;
"Mankind was born to wonder and adore."

§ 257. The Greatness of God inexpressible. "O WHAT a root! O what a branch is here! O what a father! what a family! Worlds! systems! and creations!—and creations, In one agglomerated cluster, hung, Great Vine! on thee; on thee the cluster hangs; The filial cluster! infinitely spread

In glowing globes, with various being fraught;
Or, shall I say (for who can say enough?)
A constellation of ten thousand gems,
Set in one signet, flames on the right-hand
Of majesty divine; the blazing seal,
That deeply stamps, on all created mind,
Indelible, his sovereign attributes,
Omnipotence and love: nor stop we here,

For want of power in God, but thought in man.
If greater aught, that greater all is thine,
Dread Sire!Accept this miniature of thee;
And pardon an attempt from mortal thought,
In which archangels might have fail'd, un-
blam'd."

§ 258. The Misery of Sin.

O THOU, ambitious of disgrace alone,
Rank coward to the fashionable world!
Art thou asham'd to bend thy knee to heaven?
Not all these luminaries, quench'd at once,
Were half so sad, as one benighted mind,
Which gropes for happiness, and meets despair.
How, like a widow in her weeds, the night,
Amid her glimmering tapers, silent sits!
How sorrowful, how desolate, she weeps
Perpetual dews, and saddens nature's scene!
A scene more sad sin makes the darken'd soul;
All comfort kills, nor leaves one spark alive.

$259. Reason.

THOUGH blind of heart, still open is thine eye;
Why such magnificence in all thou seest?
Of matter's grandeur, know, one end is this,
To tell the rational, who gazes on it→→
Though that immensely great, still greater he,
Whose breast, capacious, can embrace, and
lodge,

Unburthen'd, nature's universal scheme;
Can grasp creation with a single thought;
Creation grasp; and not exclude its sire
To tell him farther-It behoves him much
To guard the important, yet depending, fate
Of being, brighter than a thousand suns;
One single ray of thought outshines them all.

§ 260. Man.

O THOU most awful being! and most vain!
Thy will, how frail! how glorious is thy power!
Though dread eternity has sown her seeds
Of bliss, and woe, in thy despotic breast;
Though heaven and hell depend upon thy
thought,

A butterfly comes cross, and both are fled.
My solemn night-born adjuration hear;
Hear, and I'll raise thy spirit from the dust.

$ 261. Death.

By silence, death's peculiar attribute!
By darkness, guilt's inevitable doom:
By darkness, and by silence, sisters dread!
That draw the curtain round night's ebon
And raise ideas, solemn as the scene: [throne,
By night, and all of awful, night presents
To thought, or sense, by these her trembling
fires,

By these bright orators, that prove and praise,
And press thee to revere, the Deity:

Perhaps, too, aid thee, when rever'd a while, To reach his throne; as stages of the soul; Through which, at different periods, she shall Refining gradual, for her final height; [pass, And purging off some dross at every sphere: