And Ethiopia fpreads abroad the hand,

And worships.

Her report has travell❜d forth

Into all lands. From ev'ry clime they come

To fee thy beauty and to share thy joy,

O Sion! an affembly such as earth

Saw never, fuch as Heav'n ftoops down to fee.

Thus heav'n-ward all things tend. For all were once
Perfect, and all must be at length reftor'd.
So God has greatly purpos'd; who would elfe
In his dishonour'd works himself endure

Dishonour, and be wrong'd without redress.
Hafte, then, and wheel away a shatter'd world,
Ye flow-revolving feafons! we would fee
(A fight to which our eyes are strangers yet)
A world that does not dread and hate his laws,
And fuffer for its crime; would learn how fair
The creature is that God pronounces good,
How pleasant in itself what pleases him.
Here ev'ry drop of honey hides a fting;

Worms wind themselves into our fweeteft flow'rs;

And ev❜n the joy that haply fome poor heart
Derives from heav'n, pure as the fountain is,
Is fullied in the stream, taking a taint
From touch of human lips, at best impure.
Oh for a world in principle as chafte
As this is grofs and selfish! over which
Custom and prejudice shall bear no fway,
That govern all things here, fhould'ring afide
The meek and modeft truth, and forcing her
To feek a refuge from the tongue of strife
In nooks obfcure, far from the ways of men:-
Where violence fhall never lift the fword,

Nor cunning justify the proud man's wrong,
Leaving the poor no remedy but tears:-
Where he that fills an office fhall efteem

Th' occafion it prefents of doing good

More than the perquifite:—where law shall speak
Seldom, and never but as wisdom prompts
And equity; not jealous more to guard

A worthlefs form, than to decide aright:

Where fashion fhall not fanctify abuse,

Nor fmooth good-breeding (fupplemental grace) With lean performance ape the work of love!

Come then, and, added to thy many crowns,
Receive yet one, the crown of all the earth,
Thou who alone art worthy! It was thine
By ancient covenant, ere nature's birth;

And thou haft made it thine by purchase fince,
And overpaid its value with thy blood.

Thy faints proclaim thee king; and in their hearts

Thy title is engraven with a pen

Dipt in the fountain of eternal love.

Thy faints proclaim thee king; and thy delay

Gives courage to their foes, who, could they fee The dawn of thy laft advent, long-defir'd,

Would creep into the bowels of the hills,

And flee for fafety to the falling rocks.

The very spirit of the world is tir'd

Of its own taunting queftion, afk'd fo long,

"Where is the promife of your Lord's approach?"

The infidel has fhot his bolts away,

Till, his exhaufted quiver yielding none,

He gleans the blunted shafts that have recoil'd,
And aims them at the fhield of truth again.
The veil is rent, rent too by priestly hands,
That hides divinity from mortal eyes;
And all the mysteries to faith propos'd,
Infulted and traduc'd, are caft afide,

As ufelefs, to the moles and to the bats.

They now are deem'd the faithful, and are prais'd,

Who, conftant only in rejecting thee,

Deny thy Godhead with a martyr's zeal,

And quit their office for their error's fake.

Blind, and in love with darkness! yet ev'n thefe
Worthy, compar'd with fycophants, who knee
Thy name adoring, and then preach thee man!
So fares thy church. But how thy church may

fare

The world takes little thought. Who will may preach,

And what they will. All paftors are alike

To wand'ring sheep, refolv'd to follow none.

Two gods divide them all-Pleasure and Gain:
For these they live, they sacrifice to these,

And in their service wage perpetual war

With confcience and with thee. Luft in their hearts,

And mischief in their hands, they roam the earth

To prey upon

each other; ftubborn, fierce,

High-minded, foaming out their own difgrace.

Thy prophets speak of fuch; and, noting down
The features of the last degen'rate times,

Exhibit ev'ry lineament of these.

Come then, and, added to thy many crowns,
Receive yet one, as radiant as the reft,

Due to thy last and most effectual work,
Thy word fulfill'd, the conqueft of a world!

He is the happy man, whofe life ev'n now Shows fomewhat of that happier life to come; Who, doom'd to an obfcure but tranquil state, Is pleas'd with it, and, were he free to choose,