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Iorrour receives us, and the dismal wish Creation had been smother'd in her birthDarkness is his curtain, and his bed the dust; When stars and Sun are dust beneath his throne! n Heaven itself can such indulgence dwell? what a groan was there! a groan not his. le seiz'd our dreadful right; the load sustain'd; and heav'd the mountain from a guilty world. thousand worlds, so bought, were bought too dear; ensations new in angels' bosoms rise; uspend their song! and make a pause in bliss. O for their song; to reach my lofty theme! aspire me, Night! with all thy tuneful spheres ; Whilst I with seraphs share seraphic themes! nd show to men the dignity of man; est I blaspheme my subject with my song. hall Pagan pages glow celestial flame,

nd Christian languish? on our hearts, not heads, alls the foul infamy: my heart! awake. What can awake thee, unawak'd by this, Expended deity on human weal ?"

The Sun beheld it- no, the shocking scene
Drove back his chariot: midnight veil'd his face;
Not such as this; not such as Nature makes;
A midnight Nature shudder'd to behold;
A midnight new! a dread eclipse (without
Opposing spheres) from her Creator's frown!
Sun! didst thou fly thy Maker's pain? Or start
At that enormous load of human guilt, [cross;
Which bow'd his blessed head; o'erwhelmed his
Made groan the centre; burst Earth's marble womb,
With pangs, strange pangs! deliver'd of her dead?
Hell howl'd; and Heaven that hour let fall a tear;
Heaven wept, that men might smile! Heaven bled,

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eel the great truths, which burst the tenfold night And strike where'er they roll: my soul is caught:

of heathen errour, with a golden flood

if endless day: to feel, is to be fir'd; nd to believe, Lorenzo! is to feel. Thou most indulgent, most tremendous Power! till more tremendous, for thy wondrous love! hat arms, with awe more aweful, thy commands; and foul transgression dips in sevenfold night! How our hearts tremble at thy love immense ! n love immense, inviolably just!

hou, rather than thy justice should be stain'd, Didst stain the cross; and work of wonders far The greatest, that thy dearest far might bleed. Bold thought! shall I dare speak it, or repress? hould man more execrate, or boast, the guilt Which rous'd such vengeance? which such love inflam'd?

[arms, Y'er guilt (how mountainous !) with out-stretch'd itern justice and soft-smiling love embrace, Supporting, in full majesty, thy throne, When seem'd its majesty to need support, Or that, or man, inevitably lost;

What, but the fathomless of thought divine,
Could labour such expedient from despair,
And rescue both? both rescue! both exalt!
> how are both exalted by the deed!

The wondrous deed! or shall I call it more?
A wonder in Omnipotence itself!
A mystery no less to gods than men!

Not thus, our infidels the Eternal draw,
A God all o'er, consummate, absolute,
Full-orb'd, in his whole round of rays complete :
They set at odds Heaven's jarring attributes;
And, with one excellence, another wound;
Maim Heaven's perfection, break its equal beams,
Bid mercy triumph over- God himself,
Undeified by their opprobrious praise :
A God all mercy, is a God unjust.

Ye brainless wits! ye baptiz'd infidels ! Ye worse for mending! wash'd to fouler stains! The ransom was paid down; the fund of Heaven, Heaven's inexhaustible, exhausted fund, Amazing, and amaz'd, pour'd forth the price, All price beyond: though curious to compute, Archangels fail'd to cast the mighty sum: Its value vast, ungrasp'd by minds create, For ever hides, and glows, in the Supreme.

And was the ransom paid? it was: and paid What can exalt the bounty more?) for you!

Heaven's sovereign blessings, clustering from the

cross,

Rush on her, in a throng, and close her round,
The prisoner of amaze!-in his blest life
I see the path, and in his death the price,
And in his great ascent the proof supreme
Of immortality. And did he rise?
Hear, O ye nations! hear it, O ye dead!
He rose! he rose! he burst the bars of death.
Lift up your heads, ye everlasting gates!
And give the King of glory to come in.
Who is the King of glory? he who left
His throne of glory, for the pang of death!
Lift up your heads, ye everlasting gates!
And give the King of glory to come in.
Who is the King of glory? he who slew
The ravenous foe, that gorg'd all human race!
The King of glory, he, whose glory fill'd
Heaven with amazement at his love to man;
And with divine complacency beheld
Powers most illumin'd, wilder'd in the theme.

The theme, the joy, how then shall man sustain? Oh the burst gates! crush'd sting! demolish'd throne ! [Heaven!

Last gasp! of vanquish'd Death. Shout Earth and
This sum of good to man. Whose nature, then,
Took wing, and mounted with him from the tomb!
Then, then, I rose; then first humanity
Triumphant pass'd the crystal ports of light,
(Stupendous guest!) and seiz'd eternal youth,
Seiz'd in our name. E'er since, 't is blasphemous
To call man mortal. Man's mortality [ration
Was, then, transferr'd to death; and Heaven's du-
Unalienably seal'd to this frail frame,
This child of dust - Man, all immortal! hail;
Hail, Heaven! all lavish of strange gifts to man!
Thine all the glory; man's the boundless bliss.

Where am I rapt by this triumphant theme,
On Christian joy's exulting wing, above
Th' Aonian mount? Alas! small cause for joy!
What if to pain immortal? if extent
Of being, to preclude a close of woe?
Where, then, my boast of immortality?

I boast it still, though cover'd o'er with guilt;
For guilt, not innocence, his life he pour'd,
'T is guilt alone can justify his death!
Nor that, unless his death can justify
Relenting guilt in Heaven's indulgent sight.

If, sick of folly, I relent; he writes
My name in Heaven, with that inverted spear
(A spear deep-dipt in blood!) which pierc'd his side,
And open'd there a font for all mankind,
Who strive, who combat crimes, to drink, and live:
This, only this, subdues the fear of death.

And what is this? - Survey the wondrous cure:
And at each step, let higher wonder rise!
"Pardon for infinite offence! and pardon
Through means that speak its value infinite!
A pardon bought with blood! with blood divine!
With blood divine of him I made my foe!
Persisted to provoke! though woo'd, and aw'd,
Blest, and chastis'd, a flagrant rebel still!
A rebel, 'midst the thunders of his throne!
Nor I alone! a rebel universe!

My species up in arms! not one exempt!
Yet for the foulest of the foul he dies,
Most joy'd, for the redeem'd from deepest guilt!
As if our race were held of highest rank;
And godhead dearer, as more kind to man!"

Bound, every heart! and every bosom, burn!
O what a scale of miracles is here!
Its lowest round, high planted on the skies;
Its towering summit lost beyond the thought
Of man or angel! O that I could climb
The wonderful ascent, with equal praise!
Praise! flow for ever (if astonishment
Will give thee leave :) my praise! for ever flow;
Praise ardent, cordial, constant, to high Heaven
More fragrant, than Arabia sacrific'd,
And all her spicy mountains in a flame.

So dear, so due to Heaven, shall praise descend,
With her soft plume (from plausive angel's wing
First pluck'd by man) to tickle mortal ears,
Thus diving in the pockets of the great?
Is praise the perquisite of every paw,
Though black as Hell, that grapples well for gold?
Oh love of gold! thou meanest of amours!
Shall praise her odours waste on virtue's dead,
Embalm the base, perfume the stench of guilt,
Earn dirty bread by washing Ethiops fair,
Removing filth, or sinking it from sight,
A scavenger in scenes, where vacant posts,
Like gibbets yet untenanted, expect

Their future ornaments? From courts and thrones,
Return, apostate Praise! thou vagabond!
Thou prostitute! to thy first love return,
Thy first, thy greatest, once unrivall'd theme.

There flow redundant; like Meander flow,
Back to thy fountain; to that Parent Power,
Who gives the tongue to sound, the thought to soar,
The soul to be. Men homage pay to men,
Thoughtless beneath whose dreadful eye they bow
In mutual awe profound of clay to clay,
Of guilt to guilt; and turn their back on thee,
Great Sire! whom thrones celestial ceaseless sing:
To prostrate angels, an amazing scene!
O the presumption of man's awe for man!
Man's Author! End! Restorer! Law! and Judge!
Thine, all; day thine, and thine this gloom of night,
With all her wealth, with all her radiant worlds:
What, night eternal, but a frown from thee?
What, Heaven's meridian glory, but thy smile?
And shall not praise be thine, not human praise?
While Heaven's high host on hallelujahs live?

Omay I breathe no longer than I breathe My soul in praise to him, who gave my soul, And all her infinite of prospect fair, Cut through the shades of Hell, great love! by thee,

O most adorable! most unador'd!
Where shall thy praise begin, which ne'er shout
end?

Where'er I turn, what claim on all applause!
How is night's sable mantle labour'd o'er,
How richly wrought with attributes divine! [porp
What wisdom shines! what love! this midnigh
This gorgeous arch, with golden worlds inlay'd!
Built with divine ambition! nought to thee;
For others this profusion: thou, apart,
Above beyond! O tell me, mighty Mind!
Where art thou? Shall I dive into the deep?
Call to the Sun, or ask the roaring winds,
For their Creator! Shall I question loud
The thunder, if in that th' Almighty dwells?
Or holds he furious storms in straiten'd reins,
And bids fierce whirlwinds wheel his rapid car?
What mean these questions? Trembling, I retract;
My prostrate soul adores the present God:
Praise I a distant deity? He tunes
My voice (if tun'd); the nerve, that writes, sustains
Wrapt in his being, I resound his praise :
But though past all diffus'd, without a shore,
His essence; local is his throne, (as meet,)
To gather the disperst, (as standards call
The listed from afar): to fix a point,
A central point, collective of his sons,
Since finite every nature but his own.

The nameless He, whose nod is Nature's birth;
And Nature's shield, the shadow of his hand;
Her dissolution, his suspended smile!
The great First-Last! pavilion'd high he sits,
In darkness from excessive splendour borne,
By gods unseen, unless through lustre lost.
His glory, to created glory, bright,
As that to central horrours; he looks down
On all that soars; and spans immensity.

Though night unnumber'd worlds unfolds to view,
Boundless creation! what art thou? A beam,
A mere effluvium of his majesty :

And shall an atom of this atom-world
Mutter, in dust and sin, the theme of Heaven?
Down to the centre should I send my thought
Through beds of glittering ore; and glowing ges
Their beggar'd blaze wants lustre for my lay;
Goes out in darkness: if, on towering wing,
I send it through the boundless vault of stars!
The stars, though rich, what dross their gold to the
Great! good! wise! wonderful! eternal King!
If to those conscious stars thy throne around,
Praise ever-pouring, and imbibing bliss;
And ask their strain; they want it, more they want,
Poor their abundance, humble their sublime,
Languid their energy, their ardour cold,
Indebted still, their highest rapture burns;
Short of its mark, defective, though divine. [alone;

Still more- This theme is man's, and man's
Their vast appointments reach it not: they see
On Earth a bounty not indulg'd on high;
And downward look for Heaven's superior praise!
First born of ether! high in fields of light!
View man, to see the glory of your God!
Could angels envy, they had envied here;
And some did envy; and the rest, though gods,
Yet still gods unredeem'd, (there triumphs man,
Tempted to weigh the dust against the skies,)
They less would feel, though more adorn, my
They sung Creation (for in that they shar'd):
How rose in melody, that child of love!
Creation's great superior, man! is thine;

theme.

Thine is redemption; they just gave the key:
"T is thine to raise, and eternize, the song;
Though human, yet divine: for should not this
Raise man o'er man, and kindle seraphs here?
Redemption ! 't was creation more sublime;
Redemption ! 't was the labour of the skies;
Far more than labour - It was death in Heaven.
A truth so strange! 't were bold to think it true;
If not far bolder still to disbelieve!

Here pause, and ponder: was there death in
Heaven?

What then on Earth? On Earth, which struck the blow?

Who struck it? Who?-O how is man enlarg'd jeen through this medium! how the pigmy towers! How counterpois'd his origin from dust! How counterpois'd, to dust his sad return! How voided his vast distance from the skies! How near he presses on the seraph's wing! Which is the seraph? Which the born of clay? low this demonstrates, through the thickest cloud If guilt, and clay condens'd, the son of Heaven! he double son; the made, and the re-made! nd shall Heaven's double property be lost? Ian's double madness only can destroy. o man the bleeding cross has promis'd all; he bleeding cross has sworn eternal grace; Tho gave his life, what grace shall he deny? ye! who, from this rock of ages, leap, postates, plunging headlong in the deep! That cordial joy, what consolation strong, Thatever winds arise, or billows roll,

ur interest in the master of the storm! ling there, and in wreck'd Nature's ruin smile; While vile apostates tremble in a calm.

Man! know thyself. All wisdom centres there: o none man seems ignoble, but to man; ngels that grandeur, men o'erlook, admire: ow long shall human nature be their book, egenerate mortal! and unread by thee? he beam dim reason sheds shows wonders there; hat high contents! Illustrious faculties ! ut the grand comment, which displays at full ur human height, scarce sever'd from divine, y Heaven compos'd, was publish'd on the cross. Who looks on that, and sees not in himself n aweful stranger, a terrestrial god? glorious partner with the Deity that high attribute, immortal life?

a God bleeds, he bleeds not for a worm : gaze, and, as I gaze, my mounting soul itches strange fire, Eternity! at thee; nd drops the world - or rather, more enjoys: ow chang'd the face of Nature! how improv'd! hat seem'd a chaos, shines a glorious world, r, what a world, an Eden; heighten'd all! is another scene! another self! nd still another, as time rolls along; nd that a self far more illustrious still. eyond long ages, yet roll'd up in shades npierc'd by bold conjecture's keenest ray, hat evolutions of surprising fate! ow Nature opens, and receives my soul boundless walks of raptur'd thought! where gods ncounter and embrace me! What new births f strange adventure, foreign to the Sun; 'here what now charms, perhaps, whate'er exists, ld time, and fair creation, are forgot! Is this extravagant? Of man we form xtravagant conception, to be just :

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Conception unconfin'd wants wings to reach him:
Beyond its reach, the Godhead only, more.
He, the great Father! kindled at one flame
The world of rationals; one spirit pour'd
From spirit's aweful fountain: pour'd himself
Through all their souls; but not in equal stream,
Profuse, or frugal, of th' aspiring God,
As his wise plan demanded; and when past
Their various trials in their various spheres,
If they continue rational, as made,
Resorbs them all into himself again;

His throne their centre, and his smile their crown.
Why doubt we, then, the glorious truth to sing,
Though yet unsung, as deem'd, perhaps, too bold?
Angels are men of a superior kind;
Angels are men in lighter habit clad,
High o'er celestial mountains wing'd in flight;
And men are angels loaded for an hour,
Who wade this miry vale, and climb with pain,
And slippery step, the bottom of the steep.
Angels their failings, mortals have their praise;
While here, of corps ethereal, such enroll'd,
And summon'd to the glorious standard soon,
Which flames eternal crimson through the skies.
Nor are our brothers thoughtless of their kin,
Yet absent; but not absent from their love.
Michael has fought our battles; Raphael sung
Our triumphs; Gabriel on our errands flown,
Sent by the Sovereign: and are these, O man!
Thy friends, thy warm allies? and thou (shame burn
The cheek to cinder!) rival to the brute?

Religion's All. Descending from the skies
To wretched man, the goddess, in her left,
Holds out this world, and, in her right, the next;
Religion! the sole voucher man is man ;
Supporter sole of man above himself;
E'en in this night of frailty, change, and death,
She gives the soul a soul that acts a god.
Religion! Providence! an after-state!
Here is firm footing; here is solid rock!
This can support us; all is sea besides ;
Sinks under us; bestorms, and then devours.
His hand the good man fastens on the skies,
And bids Earth roll, nor feels her idle whirl.

As when a wretch, from thick, polluted air,
Darkness and stench, and suffocation-damps,
And dungeon-horrours, by kind fate, discharg'd,
Climbs some fair eminence, where ether pure
Surrounds him, and Elysian prospects rise,
His heart exults, his spirits cast their load:
As if new-born, he triumphs in the change;
So joys the soul, when, from inglorious aims,
And sordid sweets, from feculence and froth
Of ties terrestrial, set at large, she mounts
To reason's region, her own element,
Breathes hopes immortal, and affects the skies.

Religion! thou the soul of happiness;
And, groaning Calvary, of thee! There shine
The noblest truths; there strongest motives sting;
There sacred violence assaults the soul;
There, nothing but compulsion is forborne.
Can love allure us? or can terrour awe?
He weeps!-the falling drop puts out the Sun;
He sighs-the sigh Earth's deep foundation shakes.
If in his love so terrible, what then

His wrath inflam'd? his tenderness on fire?
Like soft, smooth oil, outblazing other fires?
Can prayer, can praise, avert it? Thou, my All!
My theme! my inspiration! and my crown!
My strength in age! my rise in low estate!

My soul's ambition, pleasure, wealth!-my world! | This mouldering, old, partition-wall throw down? My light in darkness! and my life in death!

My boast through time! bliss through eternity!
Eternity, too short to speak thy praise!
Or fathom thy profound of love to man!
To man, of men the meanest, e'en to me;
My sacrifice! my God! — what things are these!
What then art thou? by what name shall I call
thee?

Knew I the name devout archangels use,
Devout archangels should the name enjoy,
By me unrivall'd; thousands more sublime,
None half so dear, as that, which, though unspoke,
Still glows at heart: O how omnipotence
Is lost in love! Thou great philanthropist !
Father of angels! but the friend of man!
Like Jacob, fondest of the younger born!
Thou, who didst save him, snatch the smoking brand
From out the flames, and quench it in thy blood!
How art thou pleas'd, by bounty to distress!
To make us groan beneath our gratitude,
Too big for birth! to favour, and confound!
To challenge, and to distance all return!
Of lavish love stupendous heights to soar,
And leave praise panting in the distant vale!
Thy right, too great, defrauds thee of thy due;
And sacrilegious our sublimest song.
But since the naked will obtains thy smile,
Beneath this monument of praise unpaid,
And future life symphonious to my strain,
(That noblest hymn to Heaven!) for ever lie
Intomb'd my fear of death! and every fear,
The dread of every evil, but thy frown.

Whom see I, yonder, so demurely smile?
Laughter a labour, and might break their rest.
Ye quietists, in homage to the skies!
Serene! of soft address! who mildly make
An unobtrusive tender of your hearts,
Abhorring violence; who halt indeed;

But, for the blessing, wrestle not with Heaven!
Think you my song too turbulent? too warm?
Are passions, then, the pagans of the soul?
Reason alone baptiz'd? alone ordain'd

To touch things sacred? Oh for warmer still!
Guilt chills my zeal, and age benumbs my powers:
Oh for an humbler heart! and prouder song!
Thou, my much-injur'd theme! with that soft eye
Which melted o'er doom'd Salem, deign to look
Compassion to the coldness of my breast;
And pardon to the winter in my strain.

Oh ye cold-hearted, frozen, formalists!
On such a theme, 't is impious to be calm;
Passion is reason, transport temper, here.
Shall Heaven, which gave us ardour, and has shown
Her own for man so strongly, not disdain
What smooth emollients in theology,
Recumbent virtue's downy doctors, preach;
That prose of piety, a lukewarm praise?
Rise odours sweet from incense uninflam'd?
Devotion, when lukewarm, is undevout;
But when it glows, its heat is struck to Heaven;
To human hearts her golden harps are strung;
High Heaven's orchestra chaunts amen to man.

Hear I, or dream I hear, their distant strain, Sweet to the soul, and tasting strong of Heaven, Soft-wafted on celestial pity's plume, Through the vast spaces of the universe, To cheer me in this melancholy gloom? Oh when will Death (now stingless), like a friend, Admit me of their choir? O when will Death

Give beings, one in nature, one abode ?
Oh Death divine! that giv'st us to the skies!
Great future! glorious patron of the past,
And present! when shall I thy shrine adore?
From Nature's continent, immensely wide,
Immensely blest, this little isle of life,

This dark, incarcerated colony,

Divides us. Happy day! that breaks our chain; That manumits; that calls from exile home; That leads to Nature's great metropolis, And re-admits us, through the guardian hand Of elder brothers, to our Father's throne; Who hears our Advocate, and, through his wounds Beholding man, allows that tender name. 'T is this makes Christian triumph a command: 'T is this makes joy a duty to the wise; 'T is impious in a good man to be sad.

See thou, Lorenzo! where hangs all our hope? Touch'd by the cross, we live; or, more than die: That touch which touch'd not angels; more divise Than that which touch'd confusion into form, And darkness into glory: partial touch! Ineffably pre-eminent regard!

Sacred to man, and sovereign through the whole Long golden chain of miracles, which hangs From Heaven through all duration, and supports In one illustrious and amazing plan,

Thy welfare, Nature! and thy God's renown; That touch, with charm celestial, heals the soul Diseas'd, drives pain from guilt, lights life in dat Turns Earth to Heaven, to heavenly thrones tra forms

The ghastly ruins of the mouldering tomb.

Dost ask me when? When he who died returas Returns, how chang'd! Where then the man

woe?

In glory's terrours all the Godhead burns;
And all his courts, exhausted by the tide
Of deities, triumphant in his train,
Leave a stupendous solitude in Heaven;
Replenish'd soon, replenish'd with increase
Of pomp, and multitude; a radiant band
Of angels new; of angels from the tomb.

Is this my fancy thrown remote? and rise
Dark doubts between the promise and event?
I send thee not to volumes for thy cure;
Read Nature; Nature is a friend to truth;
Nature is Christian; preaches to mankind;
And bids dead matter aid us in our creed.
Hast thou ne'er seen the comet's flaming flight?
Th' illustrious stranger, passing, terrour sheds
On gazing nations; from his fiery train
Of length enormous, takes his ample round
Through depths of ether; coasts unnumber'd works
Of more than solar glory; doubles wide
Heaven's mighty cape; and then revisits Earth,
From the long travel of a thousand years.
Thus, at the destin'd period, shall return
He, once on Earth, who bids the comet blaze:
And, with him, all our triumph o'er the tomb
Nature is dumb on this important point;
Or hope precarious in low whisper breathes;
Faith speaks aloud, distinct; e'en adders hear:
But turn, and dart into the dark again.
Faith builds a bridge across the gulf of Death,
To break the shock blind Nature cannot shun,
And lands thought smoothly on the further short
Death's terrour is the mountain faith removes;
That mountain barrier between man and peace.

'Tis faith disarms destruction; and absolves From every clamorous charge, the guiltless tomb. Why disbelieve? Lorenzo!" Reason bids, All-sacred reason."— Hold her sacred still; Nor shalt thou want a rival in thy flame: All-sacred reason! source, and soul, of all Demanding praise, on Earth, or Earth above! My heart is thine: deep in its inmost folds, Live thou with life; live dearer of the two. Wear I the blessed cross, by fortune stamp'd On passive Nature, before thought was born? My birth's blind bigot! fir'd with local zeal! No! Reason re-baptis'd me when adult; Weigh'd true, and false, in her impartial scale; My heart became the convert of my head, And made that choice, which once was but my fate. On argument alone my faith is built:" Reason pursu'd is faith; and unpursued Where proof invites, 't is reason, then, no more: And such our proof, That, or our faith is right, Or Reason lies, and Heaven design'd it wrong: Absolve we this? What, then, is blasphemy? Fond as we are, and justly fond, of faith, Reason, we grant, demands our first regard; The mother honour'd, as the daughter dear. Reason the root, fair faith is but the flower; The fading flower shall die; but reason lives mmortal, as her Father in the skies. Then faith is virtue, reason makes it so. Trong not the Christian; think not reason yours: is reason our great Master holds so dear; is reason's injur'd rights his wrath resents; is reason's voice obey'd his glories crown; o give lost reason life, he pour'd his own: elieve, and show the reason of a man ; elieve, and taste the pleasure of a God! elieve, and look with triumph on the tomb: hrough reason's wounds alone thy faith can die; hich dying, tenfold terrour gives to death, nd dips in venom his twice-mortal sting.

Know ye how wise your choice, how great your gain?
Behold the picture of Earth's happiest man :
"He calls his wish, it comes; he sends it back,
And says, he call'd another; that arrives,
Meets the same welcome; yet he still calls on;
Till one calls him, who varies not his call,
But holds him fast, in chains of darkness bound,
Till Nature dies, and judgment sets him free;
A freedom far less welcome than his chain."
But grant man happy; grant him happy long:
Add to life's highest prize her latest hour;
That hour, so late, is nimble in approach,
That, like a post, comes on in full career:
How swift the shuttle flies, that weaves thy shroud!
Where is the fable of thy former years?
Thrown down the gulf of time; as far from thee
As they had ne'er been thine; the day in hand,
Like a bird struggling to get loose, is going;
Scarce now possess'd, so suddenly 't is gone;
And each swift moment fled, is death advanc'd
By strides as swift; Eternity is all;
And whose Eternity? Who triumphs there?
Bathing for ever in the font of bliss!
For ever basking in the Deity!

Lorenzo! who?-Thy conscience shall reply.
O give it leave to speak; 't will speak ere long,
Thy leave unask'd: Lorenzo! hear it now,
While useful its advice, its accent mild.
By the great edict, the divine decree,
Truth is deposited with man's last hour;
An honest hour, and faithful to her trust:
Truth, eldest daughter of the Deity;

Truth, of his council, when he made the worlds;
Nor less, when he shall judge the worlds he made;
Though silent long, and sleeping ne'er so sound,
Smother'd with errours, and opprest with toys,
That Heaven-commissioned hour no sooner calls,
But, from her cavern in the soul's abyss,
Like him they fable under Ætna whelm'd,
The goddess bursts, in thunder, and in flame;

Learn hence what honours, what loud peans, due Loudly convinces, and severely pains.

o those, who push our antidote aside;

hose boasted friends to reason, and to man,
hose fatal love stabs every joy, and leaves
eath's terrour heighten'd, gnawing on his heart.
hese pompous sons of reason idoliz'd
nd vilified at once; of reason dead,
en deify'd, as monarchs were of old;

hat conduct plants proud laurels on their brow?
hile love of truth through all their camp resounds,
hey draw Pride's curtain o'er the noon-tide ray,
ike up their inch of reason, on the point
f philosophic wit, call'd argument;
nd then, exulting in their taper, cry,
Behold the Sun" and, Indian-like, adore.
Talk they of morals? O thou bleeding Love!
ou maker of new morals to mankind!

e grand morality is love of thee.

› wise as Socrates, if such they were,
Jor will they 'bate of that sublime renown,)
swise as Socrates, might justly stand
he definition of a modern fool.

A Christian is the highest style of man:
nd is there, who the blessed cross wipes off,
sa foul blot from his dishonour'd brow?
angels tremble, 't is at such a sight:
ne wretch they quit, desponding of their charge,
ore struck with grief or wonder, who can tell?
Ye sold to sense! ye citizens of Earth!
or such alone the Christian banner fly)

Dark demons I discharge, and hydra stings;
The keen vibration of bright truth-is Hell:
Just definition! though by schools untaught.
Ye deaf to truth! peruse this parson'd page,
And trust, for once, a prophet, and a priest ;
"Men may live fools, but fools they cannot die."

NIGHT THE FIFTH.

THE RELAPSE.

TO THE RIGHT HON. THE EARL OF LITCHFIELD.

LORENZO! to recriminate is just.
Fondness for fame is avarice of air.

I grant the man is vain who writes for praise.
Praise no man e'er deserv'd, who sought no more.

As just thy second charge. I grant the Muse
Has often blush'd at her degenerate sons,
Retain'd by sense to plead her filthy cause;
To raise the low, to magnify the mean,
And subtilize the gross into refin'd:
As if to magic numbers' powerful charm
'T was given, to make a civet of their song
Obscene, and sweeten ordure to perfume.
Wit, a true pagan, deifies the brute,
And lifts our swine-enjoyments from the mire.
The fact notorious, nor obscure the cause,

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