One curse involves them all : at Death's approach
All read their riches backward into loss,
And mourn in just proportion to their store.
And Death's approach (if orthodox my song)
Is hasten'd by the lure of Fortune's smiles.
And art thou still a glutton of bright gold?
And art thou still rapacious of thy ruin?
Death loves a shining mark, a signal blow;
A blow which, while it executes, alarms,
And startles thousands with a signal fall.
As when some stately growth of oak, or pine,
Which nods aloft and proudly spreads her shade,
The sun's defiance, and the flock's defence,
By the strong strokes of labouring hinds subdu'd,
Loud groans her last, and, rushing from her height,
In cumbrous ruin thunders to the ground;
The conscious forest trembles at the shock,
And hill, and stream, and distant dale, resound.
These high-aim'd darts of Death, and these alone,
Should I collect, my quiver would be full;
A quiver which, suspended in mid air,

Or near Heaven's archer, in the zodiac, hung,
(So could it be) should draw the public eye,
The gaze and contemplation of mankind!
A constellation awful, yet benign,

To guide the Gay through life's tempestuous wave,
Nor suffer them to strike the common rock;
'From greater danger to grow more secure,
And, wrapt in happiness, forget their fate.'
Lysander, happy past the common lot,
Was warn'd of danger, but too gay to fear.
He woo'd the fair Aspasia; she was kind.
In youth,form,fortune, fame, they both were bless'd:
All who knew envied; yet in envy lov'd:

Can Fancy form more finish'd happiness?
Fix'd was the nuptial hour. Her stately dome
Rose on the sounding beach. The glittering spires
Float in the wave, and break against the shore;
So break those glittering shadows, human joys.
The faithless morning smil'd: he takes his leave
To re-embrace, in ecstasies, at eve:

The rising storm forbids: the news arrives;
Untold she saw it in her servant's eye.
She felt it seen, (her heart was apt to feel)
And drown'd, without the furious ocean's aid,
In suffocating sorrows shares his tomb.

Now round the sumptuous bridal monument
The guilty billows innocently roar,

And the rough sailor passing, drops a tear.
A tear?-can tears suffice?—but not for me.
How vain our efforts! and our arts how vain!
The distant train of thought I took, to shun,
Has thrown me on my fate.-These died together;
Happy in ruin! undivorc'd by death!

Or ne'er to meet, or ne'er to part, is peace.~
Narcissa! Pity bleeds at thought of thee;
Yet thou wast only near me, not myself.
Survive myself?—that cures all other woe.
Narcissa lives; Philander is forgot.

O the soft commerce! O the tender ties,
Close twisted with the fibres of the heart!
Which, broken, break them, and drain off the soul
Of human joy, and make it pain to live.-
And is it then to live? When such friends part,
'Tis the survivor dies.-My heart! no more.

END OF NIGHT FIFTH.

120

NIGHT VI.

THE INFIDEL RECLAIMED.

IN TWO PARTS.

Containing the Nature, Proof, and Importance, of Immortality.

PART I.

WHERE, AMONG OTHER THINGS,

GLORY AND RICHES ARE PARTICULARLY CONSIDERED.

TO THE RIGHT HON. HENRY PELHAM,

First Lord Commissioner of the Treasury, and Chancellor of the Exchequer.

PREFACE.

FEW ages have been deeper in dispute about religion than this. The dispute about religion, and the practice of it, seldom go together. The shorter, therefore, the dispute the better. I think it may be reduced to this single question, Is man immortal, or is he not? If he is not, all our disputes are mere amusements, or trials of skill. In this case, truth, reason, religion, which give our discourses such pomp and solemnity, are (as will be shown) mere empty sounds, without any meaning in them: but if man is immortal, it will behove him to be very serious about

eternal consequences; or, in other words, to be truly religious. And this great fundamental truth, unestablished, or unawakened in the minds of men, is, I conceive, the real source and support of all our infidelity, how remote soever the particular objections advanced may seem to be from it. Sensible appearances affect most men much more than abstract reasonings; and we daily see bodies drop around us, but the soul is invisible. The power which inclination has over the judgment, is greater than can be well conceived by those that have not had an experience of it; and of what numbers is it the sad interest that souls should not survive? The Heathen world confessed that they rather hoped, than firmly believed, immortality! and how many Heathens have we still amongst us! The Sacred Page assures us, that life and immortality is brought to light by the Gospel; but by how many is the Gospel rejected or overlooked! From these considerations, and from my being, accidentally, privy to the sentiments of some particular persons, I have been long persuaded that most, if not all our infidels (whatever name they take, and whatever scheme, for argunient's sake, and to keep themselves in countenance, they patronize) are supported in their deplorable error by some doubt of their immortality at the bottom: and I am satisfied, that men once thoroughly convinced of their immortality are not far from being Christians: for it is hard to conceive that a man, fully conscious eternal pain or happiness will certainly be his lot, should not earnestly and impartially inquire after the surest means of escaping one, and securing the other: and of such an earnest and impartial inquiry I well know the consequence.

Here, therefore, in proof of this most fundamental truth, some plain arguments are offered; arguments derived from principles which infidels admit in common with believers; arguments which appear to me altogether irresistible, and such as, I am satisfied, will have great weight with all who give themselves the small trouble of looking seriously into their own bosoms, and of observing, with any tolerable degree of attention, what daily passes round about them in the world. If some arguments shall here occur which others have declined, they are submitted, with all deference, to better judgments, in this, of all points, the most important! for as to the being of a God, that is no longer disputed; but it is undisputed for this reason only, viz. because where the least pretence to rea

son is admitted, it must for ever be indisputable: and, of consequence, no man can be betrayed into a dispute of that nature by vanity, which has a principal share in animating our modern combatants against other articles of our belief.

SHE' (for I know not yet her name in Heaven)
Not early, like Narcissa, left the scene,
Nor sudden, like Philander. What avail?
This seeming mitigation but inflames;
This fancied med'cine heightens the disease.
The longer known, the closer still she grew,
And gradual parting is a gradual death.
'Tis the grim tyrant's engine which extorts,
By tardy pressure's still-increasing weight,
From hardest hearts confession of distress.

O the long dark approach, through years of pain,
Death's gallery! (might I dare to call it so)
With dismal doubt and sable terror hung,
Sick Hope's pale lamp its only glimmering ray:
There Fate my melancholy walk ordain'd,
Forbid self-love itself to flatter there.
How oft I gaz'd, prophetically sad!

How oft I saw her dead, while yet in smiles!
In smiles she sunk her grief to lessen mine:
She spoke me comfort, and increas'd my pain.
Like powerful armies trenching at a town,
By slow and silent, but resistless sap,
In his pale progress gently gaining ground,
Death urg'd his deadly siege; in spite of art,
Of all the balmy blessings Nature lends

1 Referring to Night the Fifth.