No hopes, no prospect, of a kind reprieve,
To ftop our fpeedy paffage to the tomb;

How moving, and how mournful, is the fight!
How wondrous pitiful, how wondrous fad !
Where then is refuge, where is comfort, to be had
In the dark minutes of the dreadful night,
To chear our drooping fouls for their amazing flight?
Feeble and languishing in bed we lie,
Defpairing to recover, void of reft;
Withing for death, and yet afraid to die :
-Terrors and doubts diftract our breast,
With mighty agonies and mighty pains oppreft.

Our face is moiften'd with a clammy fweat
Faint and irregular the pulfes beat;

The blood unactive grows,
And thickens as it flows,

Depriv'd of all its vigour, all its vital heat.

Our dying eyes roll heavily about,
Their light just going out;

And for fome kind affiftance call:
But pity, ufelefs pity's all

Our weeping friends can give,

Or we receive;

Though their defires are great, their powers are small,

The tongue 's unable to declare

The pains and griefs, the miferies we bear;
How infupportable our torments are.

Mufic no more delights our deafening ears,
Reftores our joys, or diffipates our fears;
But all is melancholy, all is fad,
In robes of deepeft mourning clad;
For, every faculty, and every fense,
Partakes the woe of this dire exigence.

Then we are fenfible too late, 'Tis no advantage to be rich or great: For, all the fulfome pride and pageantry of state

No confolation brings.

Riches and honours then are useless things,

Taftelefs, or bitter, all;

And, like the book which the apoftle eat,
To the ill-judging palate fweet,
But turn at laft to naufeoufnefs and gall.
Nothing will then our drooping fpirits chear,
But the remembrance of good actions past.
Virtue's a joy that will for ever last,
And makes pale death lefs terrible appear;
Takes out his baneful sting, and palliates our fear.
In the dark anti-chamber of the grave

What would we give (ev'n all we have,
All that our care and induftry have gain'd,
All that our policy, our fraud, our art, obtain'd)
Could we recall thofe fatal hours again
Which we confum'd in fenfelefs vanities,
Ambitious follies, or luxurious cafe!

For then they urge our terrors, and increafe our pain

Our friends and relatives ftand weeping by,
Diffolv'd in tears, to fee us die,

And plunge into the deep abyfs of wide eternity.
In vain they mourn, in vain they grieve:
Their forrows cannot ours relieve.

They pity our deplorable eftate :

But what, alas, can pity do
To foften the decrees of fate?
Befides, the fentence is irrevocable too.

All their endeavours to preferve our breath,
Though they do unsuccessful prove,
Shew us how much, how tenderly, they love,
But cannot cut off the entail of death.
Mournful they look, and crowd about our bed:
One, with officious hafte,

Brings us a cordiał we want fenfe to tafte;
Another foftly raises up our head;

This wipes away the fweat; that, fighing, cries
See what convulfions, what ftrong agonies,
Both foul and body undergo!

His pains no intermiffion know;

For every gafp of air he draws, returns in Sighs. Each would his kind affiftance lend, To fave his dear relation, or his dearer friend; But ftill in vain with deftiny they all contend.

Our father, pale with grief and watching grown, Takes our cold hand in his, and cries, adieu! Adieu, my child! now I must follow you:

Then weeps, and gently lays it down. Our fons, who, in their tender years, Were objects of our cares, and of our fears, Come trembling to our bed, and, kneeling, cry, Blefs us, O father! now before you die; Bless us, and be you blefs'd to all eternity. Our friend, whom equal to ourselves we love, Compaffionate and kind,

Cries, will you leave me here behind? Without me fly to the blefs'd feats above? Without me, did I say? Ah, no! Without thy friend thou canst not go: For, though thou leav'ft me groveling here below, My foul with thee fhall upward fly, And bear thy spirit company,

Through the bright paffage of the yielding fky. Ev'n death, that parts thee from thyfelf, fhall be Incapable to feparate

(For 't is not in the power of fate)

My friend, my best, my dearest friend, and me: But, fince it must be fo, farewell;

For ever! No; for we shall meet again,
And live like gods, though now we die like men,
In the eternal regions, where juft spirits dwell.
The foul, unable longer to maintain

The fruitless and unequal ftrife,
Finding her weak endeavours vain,
To keep the counterscarp of life,
By flow degrees, retires towards the heart,
And fortifies that little fort
With all its kind artilleries of art;
Botanic legions guarding every port.
But death, whofe arms no mortal can repel,
A formal fiege difdains to lay;
Summons his fierce battalions to the fray,
And in a minute ftorms the feeble citadel.
Sometimes we may capitulate, and he
Pretends to make a folid peace ;
But 'tis all fham, all artifice,
That we may negligent and careless be :
For, if his armies are withdrawn to-day,
And we believe no danger near,
But all is peaceable, and all is clear;
His troops return fome unfufpected way;
While in the foft embrace of fleep we lie,
The fecret murderers ftab us, and we die.

Since

Since our firft parents' fall, Inevitable death defcends on all;

A portion none of human race can mifs
But that which makes it fweet or bitter, is
The fears of mifery, or certain hopes of bliss.
For, when the impenitent and wicked die,
Loaded with crimes and infamy;
If any fenfe at that fad time remains,
They feel amazing terrors, mighty pains;
The earneft of that vaft, ftupendous woe,
Which they to all eternity must undergo,
Confin'd in hell with everlasting chains.

Infernal spirits hover in the air,
Like ravenous wolves, to feize upon the prey,
And hurry the departed fouls away
To the dark receptacles of despair:
Where they must dwell till that tremendous day,
When the loud trump shall call them to appear
Before a Judge most terrible, and most severe ;
by whofe juft fentence they must go
To everlafting pains, and endless woe.

But the good man, whofe foul is pure,
Unfpotted, regular, and free

From all the ugly ftains of luft and villainy,
Of mercy and of pardon fure,

Looks through the darkness of the gloomy night:
And fees the dawning of a glorious day;
Sees crowds of angels ready to convey

His foul whene'er fhe takes her flight To the furprizing manfions of immortal light. Then the celeftial guards around him ftand; Nor fuffer the black dæmons of the air T'oppofe his paffage to the promis'd land, Or terrify his thoughts with wild defpair; But all is calm within, and all without is fair. His prayers, his charity, his virtues, prefs To plead for mercy when he wants it moft; No one of all the happy number's loft: And those bright advocates ne'er want fuccefs, But when the foul's releas'd from dull mortality, She paffes up in triumph through the sky; Where the 's united to a glorious throng Of angels; who, with a celeftial fong, Congratulate her conqueft as the flies along.

If therefore all muft quit the ftage,
When, or how foon, we cannot know;
But, late or early, we are fure to go;

In the fresh bloom of youth, or wither'd age;
We cannot take too fedulous a care,
In this important, grand affair:
For as we die, we must remain ;
Hereafter all our hopes are vain,

To make our peace with Heaven, or to return again.
The heathen, who no better understood

Than what the light of nature taught, declar'd, No future mifery could be prepar'd

For the fincere, the merciful, the good;

But, if there was a state of rest, They should with the fame happiness be bleft As the immortal gods, if gods there were, poffeft. We have the promise of th' eternal truth, Those who live well, and pious paths pursue, To man, and to their Maker, true, Let them expire in age, or youth,

N

WOW the black days of univerfal doom,

Which wondrous prophecies foretold, are come:
What ftrong convulfions, what ftupendous woe,
Muft finking nature undergo;

Amidst the dreadful wreck, and final overthrow!
Methinks I hear her, confcious of her fate,

With fearful groans, and hideous cries,
Fill the prefaging skies;
Unable to fupport the weight
Or of the prefent, or approaching miseries.
Methinks I hear her fummon all
Her guilty offspring raving with despair,

And trembling, cry aloud, Prepare,
Ye fublunary powers, t' attend my funeral!

See, fee the tragical portents,
Thofe difmal harbingers of dire events!
Loud thunders roar, and darting lightnings fly
Through the dark concave of the troubled sky;
The fiery ravage is begun, the end is nigh.
See how the glaring meteors blaze!

Like baleful torches, O they come,
To light diffolving Nature to her tomb!
And, fcattering round their peftilential rays,
Strike the affrighted nations with a wild amaze.
Vaft fheets of flame, and globes of fire,
By an impetuous wind are driven

Through all the regions of the inferior heaven;
Till, hid in fulphurous smoke, they seemingly expire.'

Their malice and revenge no limits know, But, in the univerfal tumult, all destroy.

Diftracted mortals from their cities fly,
For fafety to their champain ground.
But there no fafety can be found;
The vengeance of an angry Deity,
With unrelenting fury, does inclose them round:
And whilft for mercy fome aloud implore

The God they ridicul'd before;

And others, raving with their woe, (For hunger, thirst, despair, they undergo)

Blafpheme and curse the Power they should adore: The earth, parch'd up with drought, her jaws extends, And opening wide a dreadful tomb, The howling multitude at once defcends Together all into her burning womb.

The trembling Alps abfcond their aged heads
In mighty pillars of infernal fmoke,

Which from their bellowing caverns broke, And fuffocates whole nations where it fpreads. Sometimes the fire within divides

The maffy rivers of thofe fecret chains,
Which hold together their prodigious fides,
And hurls the fhatter'd rocks o'er all the plains:
While towns and cities, every thing below,
Is overwhelm'd with the fame burft of woe.

No fhowers defcend from the malignant fky,
To cool the burning of the thirsty field;

The trees no leaves, no grafs the meadows, yield,

But all is barren, all is dry.

The little rivulets no more

To larger ftreams their tribute pay,

Nor to the ebbing ocean they;

Which, with a ftrange unufual roar,

Awake, ye dead, awake, he cries; (For all muft come)

All that had human breath, arife, To hear your laft, unalterable doom.

At this the ghaftly tyrant, who had fway'd
So many thousand ages uncontroll'd,

No longer could his fceptre hold;
But gave up all, and was himself a captive made.
The fcatter'd particles of human clay,
Which in the filent grave's dark chambers lay,
Refume their pristine forms again,

And now from mortal, grow immortal men.
Stupendous energy of facred Power,

Which can collect whatever caft

The fmalleft atoms, and that shape restore Which they had worn fo many years before, That through ftrange accidents and numerous changes past!

See how the joyful angels fly
From every quarter of the sky,
To gather and to convey all
The pious fons of human race,
To one capacious place,

Above the confines of this flaming ball.

See with what tenderness and love they bear Thofe righteous fouls through the tumultuous ar Whilst the ungodly ftand below, Raging with fhame, confufion, and defpair, Amidst the burning overthrow, Expecting fiercer torment, and acuter woe. Round them infernal fpirits howling fly; O horror, curfes, tortures, chains! they cry And roar aloud with execrable blafphemy.

before:

And to the monftrous deep in vain retire:
For ev'n the deep itfelf is not fecure,

But belching fubterraneous fires,
Increases ftill the fcalding calenture,

Which neither earth, nor air, nor water, can endure.

The fun, by fympathy, concern'd

At thofe convulfions, pangs, and agonies,
Which on the whole creation feize,
Is to fubftantial darkness turn'd.
The neighbouring moon, as if a purple flood
O'erflow'd her tottering orb, appears
Like a huge mafs of black corrupted blood;
For the herself a diffolution fears.

The larger planets, which once fhone fo bright,
With the reflected rays of borrow'd light,
Shook from their centre, without motion lie,
Unwieldy globes of folid night,
And ruinous lumber of the sky.
Amidft this dreadful hurricane of woes,
(For fire, confufion, horror, and despair,
Fill every region of the tortur'd earth and air)
The great archangel his loud trumpet blows;
At whofe amazing found fresh agonies

Upon expiring nature feize:

For now the 'll in few minutes know The ultimate event and fate of all below.

Who once diffolv'd in pleafure's lap,

And laugh'd at this tremendous day,

To rocks and mountains now to hide them cry,
But rocks and mountains all in afhes lie.
Their fhame's fo mighty, and fo ftrong their fear,
That, rather than appear

Before a God incens'd, they would be hurl'd
Among the burning ruins of the world,
And lie conceal'd, if poffible, for ever there.
Time was they would not own a Deity,
Nor after death a future ftate;
But now, by fad experience, find, too late,
There is, and terrible to that degree,

That rather than behold his face, they'd ceafe to be.
And fure 'tis better, if Heaven would give confest,
To have no being; but they must remain,
For ever, and for ever be in pain.

O inexpreffible, ftupendous punishment,
Which cannot be endur'd, yet muft be underwent.

But now, the eastern skies expanding wide, The glorious Judge omnipotent defcends, And to the fublunary world his paffage bends; Where, cloath'd with human nature, he did once refie Round him the bright ethereal armies fly, And loud triumphant hallelujahs fing, With fongs of praife, and hymns of victory, To their celeftial king;

All glory, power, dominion, majesty,
Now, and for everlasting ages, be
To the Effential One, and Co-eternal Three.
Perifh that world, as 'tis decreed,
Which faw the God incarnate bleed!
Perish by the almighty vengeance those
Who durft thy perfon, or thy laws, expofe;

The curfed refuge of mankind, and hell's proud feed.
Now to the unbelieving nations fhew,
Thou art a God from all eternity;
Nor titular, or but by office fo;
And let them the mysterious union fee
Of human nature with the Deity.

With mighty tranfports, yet with awful fears,
The good behold this glorious fight!
Their God in all his majesty appears,
Ineffable, amazing bright,

And feated on a throne of everlasting light.
Round the tribunal, next to the Moft High,
In facred difcipline and order, ftand

The peers and princes of the sky,
As they excel in glory or command.
Upon the right hand that illuftrious crowd,
In the white bofom of a thining cloud,
Whofe fouls abhorring all ignoble crimes,
Did, with a steady courfe, purfue,
His holy precepts in the worst of times,
Maugre what earth or hell, what man or devils could do,
And now that God they did to death adore,
For whom fuch torments and fuch pains they bore,
Returns to place them on those thrones above,
Where, undisturb'd, uncloy'd, they will poffefs
Divine, fubftantial happiness,
Unbounded as his power, and lafting as his love.

Go, bring, the Judge impartial, frowning, cries,
Thofe rebel fons, who did my laws defpife;
Whom neither threats nor promises could move,
Not all my fufferings, nor all my love,
To fave themselves from everlasting miferies.
At this ten millions of archangels flew
Swifter than lightning, or the fwifteft thought,
And less than in an instant brought

The wretch'd, curs'd, infernal, crew;
Who with diftorted afpects came,
To hear their fad, intolerable doom.
Alas they cry, one beam of mercy fhew,

Thou all-forgiving Deity!

To pardon crimes, is natural to thee:
Crush us to nothing, or fufpend our woe.
But if it cannot, cannot be,

And we must go into a gulph of fire,

(For who can with Omnipotence contend?) Grant, for thou art a God, it may at last expire, And all our tortures have an end. Eternal burnings, O, we cannot bear ! Though now our bodies too immortal are, Let them be pungent to the last degree: And let our pains innumerable be; But let them not extend to all eternity!

Lo, now there does no place remain For penitence and tears, but all Muft by their actions ftand or fall:

To hope for pity, is in vain;

The dye is caft, and not to be recall'd again.
Two mighty books are by two angels brought:
In this, impartially recorded, ftands
The law of nature, and divine commands:
In that, each action, word, and thought,
Whate'er was faid in fecret, or in fecret wrought.
Then first the virtuous and the good,
Who all the fury of temptation stood,

And bravely pafs'd thro' ignominy, chains and blood,
Attended by their guardian angels come
To the tremendous bar of final doom.
In vain the grind accufer, railing, brings
A long indictment of enormous things,
Whofe guilt wip'd off by penitential tears,
And their Redeemer's blood and agonies,
No more to their aftonishment appears,
But in the fecret womb of dark oblivion lies.

fons of grace,

Come, now, my friends, he cries, ye
Partakers once of all my wrongs and share,
Defpis'd and hated for my name;

Come to your Saviour's and your God's embrace;
Afcend, and those bright diadems poffefs,
For you by my eternal Father made,
Ere the foundation of the world was laid;
And that furprizing happiness,

Immenfe as my own Godhead, and will ne'er be less.
For when I languishing in prison lay,'

Naked, and ftarv'd almost for want of bread,

You did your kindly vifits pay,
Both cloath'd my body, and my hunger fed.
Weary'd with fickness, or opprefs'd with grief,
Your hand was always ready to fupply:
Whene'er I wanted, you were always by,
To share my forrows, or to give relief.
In all diftrefs, fo tender was your love,
I could no anxious trouble bear;
No black misfortune, or vexatious care,
But you were still impatient to remove,
And mourn'd, your charitable hand should unfuccefsful
prove:

All this you did, though not to me
In perfon, yet to mine in mifery:
And fhall for ever live

In all the glories that a God can give
Or a created being 's able to receive.

At this the architects divine on high
Innumerable thrones of glory raife,
On which they, in appointed order, place,
The human coheirs of eternity,

And with united hymns the God incarnate praise ;
O holy, holy, holy, Lord,
Eternal God, Almighty One,

Be Thou for ever, and be Thou alone,
By all thy creatures, conftantly ador'd!
Ineffable, co-equal Three,
Who from non-entity gave birth
To angels and to men, to heaven and to earth,
Yet always waft Thyfelf, and wilt for ever be.
But for thy mercy, we had ne'er poffeft
These thrones, and this immenfe felicity;
Could ne'er have been fo infinitely bleft!

Therefore