But thou art best delighted to rehearse Heaven's holy dictates in exalted verse. O thou hast power the harden'd heart to warm, To grieve, to raise, to terrify, to charm ; To fix the soul on God; to teach the mind To know the dignity of humankind; By stricter rules well-govern'd life to scan, And practise o'er the angel in the man.
WITH THE LAST DAY.'
HERE sacred truths, in lofty numbers told,
The prospect of a future state unfold ;
The realms of night to mortal view display,
And the glad regions of eternal day.
This daring Author scorns, by vulgar ways
Of guilty wit, to merit worthless praise.
Full of her glorious theme, his towering Muse,
With generous zeal, a nobler fame pursues :
Religion's cause her ravish'd heart inspires,
And with a thousand bright ideas fires;
Transports her quick, impatient, piercing eye,
O'er the straight limits of mortality
To boundless orbs, and bids her fearless soar
Where only Milton gain'd renown before;
Where various scenes alternately excite
Amazement, pity, terror, and delight.
Thus did the Muses sing in early times, Ere skill'd to flatter vice, and varnish crimes;
Their lyres were tuned to virtuous songs alone,
And the chaste poet and the priest were one:
But now, forgetful of their infant state,
They sooth the wanton pleasures of the great;
And from the press, and the licentious stage,
With luscious poison taint the thoughtless age:
Deceitful charms attract our wandering eyes,
And specious ruin unsuspected lies.
So the rich soil of India's blooming shores, Adorn'd with lavish Nature's choicest stores, Where serpent's lurk, by flowers conceal'd from Hides fatal danger under gay delight.
[sight,
These purer thoughts, from gross allays refined,
With heavenly raptures elevate the mind:
Not framed to raise a giddy, short-lived joy,
Whose false allurements, while they please,destroy;
But bliss resembling that of saints above,
Sprung from the vision of the' Almighty Love:
Firm, solid bliss, for ever great and new,
The more 'tis known, the more admired, like you;
Like you, fair nymph! in whom united meet
Endearing sweetness, unaffected wit,
And all the glories of your sparkling race,
While inward virtues heighten every grace.
By these secured, you will with pleasure read
Of future judgment, and the rising dead; [thrown;
Of Time's grand period, Heaven and Earth o'er-
And gasping Nature's last tremendous groan.
These, when the stars and sun shall be no more,
Shall beauty to your ravaged form restore :
Then shall you shine with an immortal ray,
Improved by death, and brighten'd by decay.
LAST DAY,' AND UNIVERSAL PASSION.'
AND must it be as thou hast sung,
Celestial bard, seraphic Young!
Will there no trace, no point be found
Of all this spacious, glorious round?
Yon lamps of light, must they decay?
On Nature's self Destruction prey?
Then Fame, the most immortal thing
E'en thou canst hope, is on the wing.
Shall Newton's system be admired,
When time and motion are expired?
Shall souls be curious to explore
Who ruled an orb, that is no more?
Or shall they quote the pictured age,
From Pope's and thy corrective page,
When Vice and Virtue lose their name
In deathless joy or endless shame?
While wears away the grand machine,
The works of genius shall be seen:
Beyond, what laurels can there be
For Homer, Horace, Pope, or thee?
Through life we chase, with fond pursuit,
What mocks our hope, like Sodom's fruit;
And, sure, thy plan was well design'd
To cure this madness of the mind;
First beyond time our thoughts to raise,
Then lash our love of transient praise;
In both we own thy doctrine just,
And fame's a breath, and men are dust.
As the occasion of this poem was real, not fictitious, so the method pursued in it was rather imposed by what spontaneously arose in the author's mind on that occasion, than meditated or designed; which will appear very probable from the nature of it; for it differs from the common mode of poetry, which is, from long narrations to draw short morals: here, on the contrary, the narrative is short, and the morality arising from it makes the bulk of the poem. The reason of it is, that the facts mentioned did naturally pour these moral reflections on the thought of the writer.
On Life, Death, and Immortality.
TO THE RIGHT HON. ARTHUR ONSLOW, ESQ.
SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.
TIRED Nature's sweet restorer, balmy Sleep!
He, like the world, his ready visit pays
Where Fortune smiles; the wretched he forsakes;
Swift on his downy pinion flies from woe,
And lights on lids unsullied with a tear.
From short (as usual) and disturb'd repose
I wake: how happy they who wake no more!
Yet that were vain, if dreams infest the grave.
I wake, emerging from a sea of dreams
Tumultuous; where my wreck'd, desponding
thought,
From wave to wave of fancied misery
At random drove, her helm of reason lost.
Though now restored, 'tis only change of pain,
(A bitter change'!) severer for severe :
The Day too short for my distress; and Night,
E'en in the zenith of her dark domain,
Is sunshine to the colour of my fate.
Night, sable goddess! from her ebon throne,
In rayless majesty, now stretches forth
Her leaden sceptre o'er a slumbering world.
Silence how dead! and darkness how profound!
Nor eye nor listening ear an object finds;
Creation sleeps. Tis as the general pulse
Of life stood still, and Nature made a pause ;
An awful pause! prophetic of her end.
And let her prophecy be soon fulfill'd :
Fate! drop the curtain; I can lose no more.
Silence and Darkness! solemn sisters! twins
From ancient Night, who nurse the tender thought
To Reason, and on Reason build Resolve,
(That column of true majesty in man)
Assist me: I will thank you in the grave;
The grave your kingdom: there this frame shall fall
A victim sacred to your dreary shrine.
But what are ye ?—
Thou, who didst put to flight
Primeval Silence, when the morning stars,
Exulting, shouted o'er the rising ball;
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