What rocks are these, on which to build our trust!
Thy ways admit no blemish; none I find;
Or this alone-" That none is to be found."
Not one, to soften censure's hardy crime;
Not one, to palliate peevish grief's complaint,
Who like a demon, murmuring from the dust,
Dares into judgment call her Judge.-Supreme!
For all I bless thee; most, for the severe ;
Her death-my own at hand-the fiery gulf,
That flaming bound of wrath omnipotent!
It thunders;-but it thunders to preserve;
It strengthens what it strikes; its wholesome dread
Averts the dreaded pain; its hideous groans
Join Heaven's sweet hallelujahs in thy praise,
Great source of good alone! How kind in all!
In vengeance kind! pain, death, gehenna save.
Thus, in thy world material, Mighty Mind!
Not that alone which solaces, and shines,
The rough and gloomy, challenges our praise.
The winter is as needful as the spring;
The thunder, as the Sun; a stagnant mass
Of vapors breeds a pestilential air;
Nor more propitious the Favonian breeze
To Nature's health, than purifying storms;
The dread valcano ministers to good.
Its smother'd flames might undermine the world.
Loud Etnas fulminate in love to man;
Comets good omens are when duly scann'd;
And, in their use, eclipses learn to shine.
Man is responsible for ills receiv'd;
Those we call wretched are a chosen band,
Compell'd to refuge in the right, for peace.
Amid my list of blessings infinite,
Stand this the foremost, "That my heart has bled."
"Tis Heaven's last effort of good-will to man;
When pain can't bless, Heaven quits us in despair.
Who fails to grieve, when just occasion calls,
Or grieves too much, deserves not to be blest;
Inhuman, or effeminate, his heart;
Reason absolves the grief, which reason ends.
The grand tribunal rais'd; assign'd the bounds
Of human grief: in few, to close the whole,
The moral Muse has shadow'd out a sketch.
Though not in form, nor with a Raphael-stroke,
Of most our weakness needs believe, or do,
In this our land of travel and of hope,
For peace on Earth, or prospect of the skies.
What then remains? Much! much! a mighty dex
To be discharg'd: these thoughts, O Night! are
thine:
From thee they came, like lovers' secret sighs,
While others slept. So Cynthia (poets feign)
In shadows veil'd, soft sliding from her sphere,
Her shepherd cheer'd; of her enamour'd less,
Than I of thee-And art thou still unsung,
Beneath whose brow, and by whose aid, I sing!
Immortal silence! where shall I begin?
Where end? Or how steal music from the spheres
To soothe their goddess?
O majestic Night?
Nature's great ancestor? day's elder-born!
And fated to survive the transient Sun!
By mortals, and immortals, seen with awe!
A starry crown thy raven brow adorns,
An azure zone, thy waist; clouds, in Heaven's lo
Wrought through varieties of shape and shade,
In ample folds of drapery divine,
Thy flowing mantle form; and Heaven througho
Voluminously pour thy pompous train.
Thy gloomy grandeurs (Nature's most august,
Inspiring aspect!) claim a grateful verse;
And, like a sable curtain starr'd with gold,
Drawn o'er my labors past, shall close the scene.
And what, O man! so worthy to be sung!
What more prepares us for the songs of Heaven'
Creation, of archangels is the theme!
What, to be sung, so needful? What so well
Celestial joys prepare us to sustain?
The soul of man, his face design'd to see
Who gave these wonders to be seen by man,
May Heaven ne'er trust my friend with happiness,Has here a previous scene of objects great,
Till it has taught him how to bear it well,
By previous pain; and made it safe to smile!
Such smiles are mine, and such may they remain ;
Nor hazard their extinctions, from excess.
My change of heart a change of style demands;
The consolation cancels the complaint,
And makes a convert of my guilty song.
And when o'erlabor'd, and inclin'd to breathe,
A panting traveller some rising ground,
Some small ascent, has gain'd, he turns him round,
And measures with his eye the various vales,
The fields, woods, meads, and rivers, he has past;
And, satiate of his journey, thinks of home,
Endear'd by distance, nor affects more toil;
Thus I, though small, indeed, is that ascent
The Muse has gain'd, review the paths she trod;
Various, extensive, beaten but by few;
And, conscious of her prudence in repose,
Pause; and with pleasure meditate an end,
Though still remote; so fruitful is my theme.
Through many a field of moral, and divine,
The muse has stray'd; and much of sorrow seen
In human ways; and much of false and vain;
Which none, who travel this bad road, can miss.
O'er friends deceas'd full heartily she wept;
Of love divine the wonders she display'd;
Prov'd man immortal; show'd the source of joy;
On which to dwell; to stretch to that expanse
Of thought, to rise to that exalted height
Of admiration, to contract that awe,
And give her whole capacities that strength,
Which best may qualify for final joy.
The more our spirits are enlarg'd on Earth.
The deeper draught shall they receive of Homes
Heaven's King! whose face unveil'd cons
Redundant bliss! which fills that mighty void,
The whole creation leaves in human hearts!
Thou, who didst touch the lip of Jesse's son,
Rapt in sweet contemplation of these fires,
And set his harp in concert with the spheres;
While of thy works material the supreme
I dare attempt, assist my daring song;
Loose me from Earth's inclosure, from the Sun's
Contracted circle set my heart at large;
Eliminate my spirit, give it range
Through provinces of thought yet unexplor'd ;
Teach me by this stupendous scaffolding,
Creation's golden steps, to climb to thee.
Teach me with art great Nature to control,
And spread a lustre o'er the shades of night.
Feel I thy kind assent? and shall the Sun
Be seen at midnight, rising in my song!
Lorenzo! come, and warm thee: thou, whose heart.
Whose little heart, is moor'd within a nook
Of this obscure terrestrial, anchor weigh
Another ocean calls, a nobler port;
I am thy pilot, I thy prosperous gale.
Gainful thy voyage through yon azure main;
Main, without tempest, pirate, rock, or shore;
And whence thou may'st import eternal wealth;
And leave to beggar'd minds the pearl and gold.
Thy travels dost thou boast o'er foreign realms ?
Thou stranger to the world! thy tour begin;
Thy tour through Nature's universal orb.
Nature delineates her whole chart at large,
On soaring souls, that sail among the spheres ;
And man how purblind, if unknown the whole!
Who circles spacious Earth, then travels here,
Shall own, he never was from home before!
Come, my Prometheus,* from thy pointed rock
Of false ambition if unchain'd, we'll mount;
We'll, innocently, steal celestial fire,
And kindle our devotion at the stars;
A theft, that shall not chain, but set thee free.
Above our atmosphere's intestine wars,
Rain's fountain-head, the magazine of hail;
Above the northern nests of feather'd snows,
The brew of thunders, and the flaming forge
That forms the crooked lightning; above the caves
Where infant tempests wait their growing wings,
And tune their tender voices to that roar,
Which soon, perhaps, shall shake a guilty world;
Above misconstru'd omens of the sky,
Far-travel'd comets' calculated blaze;
Elance thy thought, and think of more than man.
Thy soul, till now, contracted, wither'd, shrunk,
Blighted by blasts of Earth's unwholesome air,
Will blossom here; spread all her faculties
To these bright ardors; every power unfold,
And rise into sublimities of thought.
Stars teach, as well as shine. At Nature's birth,
Thus their commission ran-" Be kind to man."
Where art thou, poor benighted traveller?
The stars will light thee, though the Moon should fail
Where art thou, more benighted! more astray!
In ways immoral? The stars call thee back;
And, if obey'd their counsel, set thee right.
This prospect vast, what is it?-Weigh'd aright,
"Tis Nature's system of divinity,
And every student of the night inspires.
"Tis elder Scripture, writ by God's own hand :
Scripture authentic! uncorrupt by man.
Lorenzo! with my radius (the rich gift
Of thought nocturnal!) I'll point out to thee
Its various lessons; some that may surprise
An un-adept in mysteries of night;
Little, perhaps, expected in her school,
Nor thought to grow on planet, or on star.
Bulls, lions, scorpions, monsters, here we feign;
Ourselves more monstrous, not to see what here
Exists indeed;-a lecture to mankind.
What read we here?-Th' existence of a God?
Yes; and of other beings, man above;
Natives of ether! Sons of higher climes!
And, what may move Lorenzo's wonder more,
Eternity is written in the skies.
And whose eternity?-Lorenzo! thine;
Mankind's eternity. Nor faith alone,
Those tyrants I for thee so lately fought,
Afford their harass'd slaves but slender rest.
Thou, to whom midnight is immoral noon,
And the Sun's noontide blaze, prime dawn of day;
Not by thy climate, but capricious crime,
Commencing one of our Antipodes!
In thy nocturnal rove one moment halt,
"Twixt stage and stage, of riot, and cabal;
And lift thine eye (if bold an eye to lift,
If bold to meet the face of injur'd Heaven)
To yonder stars: for other ends they shine,
Than to light revellers from shame to shame,
And, thus, be made accomplices in guilt.
Why from yon arch, that infinite of space,
With infinite of lucid orbs replete,
Which set the living firmament on fire,
At the first glance, in such an overwhelm
Of wonderful, on man's astonish'd sight,
Rushes Omnipotence?-To curb our pride;
Our reason rouse, and lead it to that power,
Whose love lets down these silver chains of light,
To draw up man's ambition to himself,
And bind our chaste affections to his throne.
Thus the three virtues, least alive on Earth,
And welcom'd on Heaven's coast with most ap-
plause,
An humble, pure, and heavenly-minded heart,
Are here inspir'd:-And canst thou gaze too long
Nor stands thy wrath, depriv'd of its reproof,
Or un-upbraided by this radiant choir.
The planets of each system represent
Kind neighbors; mutual amity prevails;
Sweet interchange of rays, receiv'd, return'd;
Enlightening, and enlighten'd! All, at once
Attracting, and attracted! Patriot-like,
None sins against the welfare of the whole;
But their reciprocal, unselfish aid,
Affords an emblem of millennial love.
Nothing in Nature, much less conscious being,
Was e'er created solely for itself:
Thus man his sovereign duty learns in this
Material picture of benevolence.
And know, of all our supercilious race,
Thou most inflammable! thou wasp of men!
Man's angry heart, inspected, would be found
As rightly set, as are the starry spheres;
"Tis Nature's structure, broke by stubborn will,
Breeds all that un-celestial discord there,
Wilt thou not feel the bias Nature gave?
Canst thou descend from converse with the skies,
And seize thy brother's throat?—For what-a clod,
An inch of earth? The planets cry, "Forbear!"
They chase our double darkness; Nature's gloom,
And (kinder still!) our intellectual night.
And see, Day's amiable sister sends
Her invitation, in the softest rays
Of mitigated lustre; courts thy sight,
Which suffers from her tyrant-brother's blaze.
Night grants thee the full freedom of the skies,
Nor rudely reprimands thy lifted eye;
With gain, and joy, she bribes thee to be wise.
Night opes the noblest scenes, and sheds an awe,
Which gives those venerable scenes fell weight,
Virtue grows here; here springs the sovereign cure And deep reception, in th' entender'd heart;
Of almost every vice; but chiefly thine;
Wrath, pride, ambition, and impure desire.
Lorenzo! thou canst wake at midnight too,
Though not on morals bent: ambition, pleasure!
While light peeps through the darkness, like a spy
And darkness shows its grandeur by the light.
Nor is the profit greater than the joy,
If human hearts at glorious objects glow, And admiration can inspire delight.
What speak I more, than I, this moment, feel?
With pleasing stupor first the soul is struck,
(Stupor ordain'd to make her truly wise!)
Then into transport starting from her trance,
With love, and admiration, how she glows!
This gorgeous apparatus! this display!
This ostentation of creative power!
This theatre-what eye can take it in?
By what divine enchantment was it rais'd,
For minds of the first magnitude to launch
In endless speculation, and adore?
One sun by day, by night ten thousand shine:
And light us deep into the Deity;
How boundless in magnificence and might!
O what a confluence of ethereal fires,
From urns unnumber'd, down the steep of Heaven,
Streams to a point, and centres in my sight!
Nor tarries there; I feel it at my heart.
My heart, at once, it humbles, and exalts;
Lays it in dust, and calls it to the skies.
Who sees it unexalted? or unaw'd?
Who sees it, and can stop at what is seen?
Material offspring of Omnipotence!
Inanimate, all-animating birth!
Work worthy him who made it! worthy praise!
All praise praise more than human! nor denied
Thy praise divine!-But though man, drown'd
sleep,
Withholds his homage, not alone I wake;
Bright legions swarm unseen, and sing, unheard
By mortal ear, the glorious Architect,
In this his universal temple hung
With lustres, with innumerable lights,
That shed religion on the soul: at once,
The temple, and the preacher! O how loud
It calls devotion! genuine growth of night!
Devotion! daughter of astronomy!
An undevout astronomer is mad.
True, all things speak a God; but in the small,
Men trace out him; in great, he seizes man;
Seizes, and elevates, and wraps, and fills
With new inquiries, 'mid associates new.
Tell me, ye stars! ye planets! tell me, all
Ye starr'd, and planeted, inhabitants! What is it?
What are these sons of wonder? Say, proud arch,
(Within whose azure palaces they dwell,)
Built with divine ambition! in disdain
Of limit built! built in the taste of Heaven!
Vast concave! ample dome! wast thou design'd
A meet apartment for the Deity ?—
Not so; that thought alone thy state impairs,
Thy lofty sinks, and shallows thy profound,
And straitens thy diffusive; dwarfs the whole,
And makes an universe an orrery.
But when I drop mine eye, and look on man,
Thy right regain'd, thy grandeur is restor'd,
O Nature! wide flies off the expanding round.
As when whole magazines, at once, are fir'd,
The smitten air is hollow'd by the blow;
The vast displosion dissipates the clouds;
Shock'd ether's billows dash the distant skies;
Thus (but far more) th' expanding round flies off,
And leaves a mighty void, a spacious womb,
Might teem with new creation; re-inflam'd
Thy luminaries triumph, and assume
Divinity themselves. Nor was it strange,
Matter high-wrought to such surprising pomp,
Such godlike glory, stole the style of gods,
From ages dark, obtuse, and steep'd in sense,
For, sure, to sense, they truly are divine;
And half-absolv'd idolatry from guilt;
Nay, turn'd it into virtue. Such it was
In those, who put forth all they had of man
Unlost, to lift their thought, nor mounted higher;
But, weak of wings, on planets perch'd; and thought
What was their highest, must be their ador'd.
But they how weak, who could no higher mount!
And are there, then, Lorenzo! those, to whom
Unseen, and unexistent, are the same?
And if incomprehensible is join'd,
Who dare pronounce it madness, to believe?
Why has the mighty builder thrown aside
All measure in his work; stretch'd out his line
So far, and spread amazement o'er the whole!
Then (as he took delight in wide extremes)
Deep in the bosom of his universe,
Dropt down that reasoning mite, that insect, man,
To crawl, and gaze, and wonder at the scene!-
That man might ne'er presume to plead amazement
For disbelief of wonders in himself.
Shall God be less miraculous, than what
His hand has form'd? Shall mysteries descend
From un-mysterious? Things more elevate,
Be more familiar? Uncreated lie
More obvious than created, to the grasp
Of human thought? The more of wonderful
Is heard in him, the more we should assent.
Could we conceive him, God he could not be;
Or he not God, or we could not be men.
A God alone can comprehend a God;
Man's distance how immense! On such a theme,
Know this, Lorenzo! (seem it ne'er so strange)
Nothing can satisfy, but what confounds;
Nothing, but what astonishes, is true.
The scene thou seest, attests the truth I sing,
And every star sheds light upon thy creed.
These stars, this furniture, this cost of Heaven,
If but reported, thou hadst ne'er believ'd;
But thine eye tells thee, the romance is true.
The grand of Nature is th' Almighty's oath,
In reason's court, to silence unbelief.
How my mind, opening at this scene, imbibes
The moral emanations of the skies,
While nought, perhaps, Lorenzo less admires!
Has the Great Sovereign sent ten thousand world
To tell us, he resides above them all,
In glory's unapproachable recess?
And dare Earth's bold inhabitants deny
The sumptuous, the magnific embassy
A moment's audience? Turn we, nor will hear
From whom they come, or what they would impart
For man's emolument; sole cause that stoops
Their grandeur to man's eye? Lorenzo! rouse;
Let thought, awaken'd, take the lightning's wing.
And glance from east to west, from pole to pole.
Who sees, but is confounded, or convinc'd ?
Renounces reason, or a God adores?
Mankind was sent into the world to see:
Sight gives the science needful to their
peace;
That obvious science asks small learning's aid.
Wouldst thou on metaphysic pinions soar?
Or wound thy patience amid logic thorns?
Or travel history's enormous round?
Nature no such hard task enjoins: she gave
A make to man directive of his thought;
A make set upright, pointing to the stars,
As who shall say, " Read thy chief lesson there.”
Too late to read this manuscript of Heaven,
When, like a parchment-scroll shrunk up by flames, Celestial art's intent. The trembling stars
It folds Lorenzo's lesson from his sight.
Lesson how various! Not the God alone,
I see his ministers: I see, diffus'd
In radiant orders, essences sublime,
Of various offices, of various plumė,
In heavenly liveries distinctly clad,
Azure, green, purple, pearl, or downy gold,
Or all commix'd; they stand, with wings outspread,
Listening to catch the master's least command,
And fly through Nature, ere the moment ends;
Numbers innumerable!-Well conceiv'd
By Pagan, and by Christian! O'er each sphere
Presides an angel, to direct its course,
And feed, or fan, its flames; or to discharge
Other high trusts unknown. For who can see
Such pomp of matter, and imagine, mind,
For which alone inanimate was made,
More sparingly dispens'd? That nobler son,
Far liker the great Sire!-"Tis thus the skies
Inform us of superiors numberless,
As much in excellence, above mankind,
As above Earth, in magnitude, the spheres.
These, as a cloud of witnesses, hang o'er us;
In a throng'd theatre are all our deeds;
Perhaps, a thousand demi-gods descend
On every beam we see, to walk with men.
Awful reflection! Strong restraint from ill!
Yet, here, our virtue finds still stronger aid
From these ethereal glories sense surveys.
See crimes gigantic, stalking through the gloom
With front erect, that hide their head by day,
And making night still darker by their deeds.
Slumbering in covert, till the shades descend,
Rapine and murder, link'd, now prowl for prey.
The miser earths his treasure; and the thief,
Watching the mole, half-beggars him ere morn.
Now plots, and foul conspiracies, awake;
And, muffling up their horrors from the Moon,
Havoc and devastation they prepare,
And kingdoms tottering in the field of blood.
Now sons of riot in mid-revel rage.
What shall I do ?-Suppress it? or proclaim?-
Why sleeps the thunder? Now, Lorenzo! now,
His best friend's couch the rank adulterer
Ascends secure; and laughs at gods and men.
Preposterous madmen, void of fear or shame,
Lay their crimes bare to these chaste eyes of Heaven;
Yet shrink, and shudder, at a mortal's sight.
Were Moon and stars for villains only made?
To guide, yet screen them, with tenebrious light?
No, they were made to fashion the sublime
Of human hearts, and wiser make the wise.
Those ends were answer'd once; when mortals
Of stronger wing, of aquiline ascent
In theory sublime. O how unlike
Those vermin of the night, this moment sung,
Who crawl on Earth, and on her venom feed!
Those ancient sages, human stars! they met
Something, like magic, strikes from this blue vault; Their brothers of the skies, at midnight hour;
Their counsel ask'd; and, what they ask'd, obey'd.
The Stagyrite, and Plato, he who drank
The poison'd bowl, and he of Tusculum,
With him of Corduba (immortal names!)
In these unbounded, and Elysian, walks,
An area fit for gods, and godlike men,
They took their nightly round, through radiant paths
By seraphs trod; instructed, chiefly, thus,
To tread in their bright footsteps here below;
To walk in worth still brighter than the skies.
There they contracted their contempt of Earth;
Of hopes eternal kindled, there, the fire;
There, as in near approach, they glow'd, and grew
(Great visitants!) more intimate with God,
pride,More worth to men, more joyous to themselves.
Through various virtues, they, with ardor, ran
The zodiac of their learn'd illustrious lives.
In Christian hearts, O for a Pagan zeal!
A needful, but opprobrious prayer! as much
Our ardor less, as greater is our light.
How monstrous this in mortals! Scarce more strange
Would this phenomenon in Nature strike,
With just attention is it view'd? We feel
A sudden succor, unimplor'd, unthought;
Nature herself does half the work of man.
Seas, rivers, mountains, forests, deserts, rocks,
The promontory's height, the depth profound
Of subterranean, excavated grots,
Black-brow'd, and vaulted high, and yawning wide
From Nature's structure, or the scoop of Time,
If ample of dimension, vast of size,—
E'en these an aggrandizing impulse give;
Of solemn thought enthusiastic heights
E'en these infuse.-But what of vast in these?
Nothing; or we must own the skies forgot.
Much less in art!—Vain art! Thou pigmy power!
How dost thou swell and strut, with human
To show thy littleness! What childish toys,
Thy watery columns squirted to the clouds!
Thy bason'd rivers, and imprison'd seas!
Thy mountains moulded into forms of men!
Thy hundred-gated capitals! or those
Where three days' travel left us much to ride;
Gazing on miracles by mortals wrought,
Arches triumphal, theatres immense,
Or nodding gardens pendent in mid-air!
Or temples proud to meet their gods half-way!
Yet these affect us in no common kind.
What then the force of such superior scenes?
Enter a temple, it will strike an awe:
What awe from this the Deity has built!
A good man seen, though silent, counsel gives:
The touch'd spectator wishes to be wise:
In a bright mirror his own hands have made,
Here we see something like the face of God.
Seems it not then enough, to say, Lorenzo!
To man abandon'd, "Hast thou seen the skies?"
And yet, so thwarted Nature's kind design
By daring man, he makes her sacred awe
(That guard from ill) his shelter, his temptation
To more than common guilt, and quite inverts
A Sun, that froze her, or a star, that warm'd.
What taught these heroes of the moral world?
To these thou giv'st thy praise, give credit too.
These doctors ne'er were pension'd to deceive thee;
And Pagan tutors are thy taste.-They taught,
That narrow views betray to misery:
That wise it is to comprehend the whole:
That virtue rose from Nature, ponder'd well,
The single base of virtue built to Heaven:
That God and Nature our attention claim:
That Nature is the glass reflecting God,
As, by the sea, reflected is the Sun,
Too glorious to be gaz'd on in his sphere:
That mind immortal loves immortal aims:
That boundless mind affects a boundless space
That vast surveys, and the sublime of things,
The soul assimilate, and make her great,
That, therefore, Heaven her glories, as a fund
Of inspiration, thus spreads out to man.
Such are their doctrines; such the night inspir'd.
And what more true? What truth of greater
weight?
The soul of man was made to walk the skies;
Delightful outlet of her prison here!
There, disencumber'd from her chains, the ties
Of toys terrestrial, she can rove at large;
There, freely can respire, dilate, extend,
In full proportion let loose all her powers;
And, undeluded, grasp at something great.
Nor, as a stranger, does she wander there;
But, wonderful herself, through wonder strays;
Contemplating their grandeur, finds her own;
Dives deep in their economy divine,
Sits high in judgment on their various laws,
And, like a master, judges not amiss.
Hence greatly pleas'd, and justly proud, the soul
Grows conscious of her birth celestial; breathes
More life, more vigor, in her native air;
And feels herself at home amongst the stars;
And, feeling, emulates our country's praise.
What call we, then, the firmament, Lorenzo ?—
As earth the body, since the skies sustain
The soul with food, that gives immortal life,
Call it, the noble pasture of the mind;
Which there expatiates, strengthens, and exults,
And riots through the luxuries of thought.
Call it, the garden of the Deity,
Blossom'd with stars, redundant in the growth
Of fruit ambrosial; moral fruit to man.
Call it, the breast-plate of the true High-Priest,
Ardent with gems oracular, that give,
In points of highest moment, right response;
And ill neglected, if we prize our peace.
Thus have we found a true astrology;
Thus have we found a new, and noble sense,
In which alone stars govern human fates.
O that the stars (as some have feign'd) let fall
Bloodshed, and havoc, on embattled realms,
And rescued monarchs from so black a guilt!
Bourbon this wish how generous in a foe!
Wouldst thou be great, wouldst thou become a God,
And stick thy deathless name among the stars,
For mighty conquests on a needle's point?
Instead of forging chains for foreigners,
Bastile thy tutor: grandeur all thy aim?
As yet thou know'st not what it is: how great,
How glorious, then, appears the mind of man,
When in it all the stars, and planets, roll!
And what it seems, it is: great objects make
Great minds, enlarging as their views enlarge;
Those still more godlike, as these more divine.
And more divine than these, thou canst not see.
Dazzled, o'erpower'd, with the delicious draught
Of miscellaneous splendors, how I reel
From thought to thought, inebriate, without end!
An Eden, this! a Paradise unlost!
I meet the Deity in every view,
And tremble at my nakedness before him!
O that I could but reach the tree of life!
For here it grows, unguarded from our taste;
No flaming sword denies our entrance here;
Would man but gather, he might live for ever.
Lorenzo! much of moral hast thou seen.
Of curious arts art thou more fond? Then mark
The mathematic glories of the skies,
In number, weight, and measure, all ordain'd.
Lorenzo's boasted builders, chance, and fate,
Are left to finish his aërial towers;
Wisdom and choice, their well-known characters
Here deep impress; and claim it for their own.
Though splendid all, no splendor void of use;
Use rivals beauty; art contends with power;
No wanton waste, amid effuse expense;
The great economist adjusting all
To prudent pomp, magnificently wise.
How rich the prospect! and for ever new!
And newest to the man that views it most;
For newer still in infinite succeeds.
Then, these aërial racers, O how swift!
How the shaft loiters from the strongest string!
Spirit alone can distance the career.
Orb above orb ascending without end!
Circle in circle, without end, inclos'd!
Wheel, within wheel; Ezekiel like to thine!
Like thine, it seems a vision or a dream;
Though seen, we labor to believe it true!
What involution! what extent! what swarms
Of worlds, that laugh at Earth! immensely great'
Immensely distant from each other's spheres!
What, then, the wondrous space through which they
roll?
At once it quite ingulfs all human thought;
'Tis comprehension's absolute defeat.
Nor think thou see'st a wild disorder here;
Through this illustrious chaos to the sight,
Arrangement neat, and chastest order, reign.
The path prescrib'd, inviolably kept,
Upbraids the lawless sallies of mankind.
Worlds, ever thwarting, never interfere;
What knots are tied! How soon are they dissolv'd
And set the seeming married planets free!
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!
Leaves so much wonder greater wonder still!
Where are the pillars that support the skies!
What more than Atlantean shoulder props
Th' incumbent load? what magic, what strange art
In fluid air these ponderous orbs sustains!
Who would not think them hung in golden chains!
And so they are; in the high will of Heaven,
Which fixes all; makes adamant of air,
Or air of adamant; makes all of nought,
Or nought of all; if such the dread decree.
Imagine from their deep foundations torn
The most gigantic sons of Earth, the broad
And towering Alps, all tost into the sea;
And, light as down, or volatile as air,
Their bulks enormous, dancing on the waves,
In time, and measure, exquisite; while all
The winds, in emulation of the spheres,
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