Page images
PDF
EPUB

Not only enlighten, but, with kindly heat
Of various influence, foment and warm,
Temper or nourish; or in part shed down
Their stellar virtue on all kinds that grow
On earth, made hereby apter to receive
Perfection from the sun's more potent ray.
These then, though unbeheld in deep of night,
Shine not in vain; nor think though men were none,
That heaven would want spectators, God want praise.
Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth
Unseen, both when we wake, and when we sleep.
All these with ceaseless praise his works behold,
Both day and night. How often, from the steep
Of echoing hill or thicket have we heard
Celestial voices to the midnight air,

Sole, or responsive each to others' note,
Singing their great Creator? Oft in bands,
While they keep watch, or nightly rounding walk
With heavenly touch of instrumental sounds,
In full harmonic number join'd their songs
Divide the night, and lift our thoughts to heaven."
Thus talking hand in hand alone they pass'd
On to their blissful bower-

......There arriv'd, both stood,

Both turn'd and under open sky ador'd

The God that made both sky, air, earth, and heaven,
Which they beheld, the moon's resplendent globe,
And starry pole. "Thou also mad'st the night,
Maker Omnipotent, and thou the day,
Which, we in our appointed work employ'd,
Have finish'd happy in our mutual help,
And mutual love, the crown of all our bliss,
Ordain'd by thee; and this delicious place
For us too large, where thy abundance wants
Partakers, and uncropt falls to the ground.
But thou hast promis'd from us two a race,
To fill the earth, who shall with us extol
Thy goodness infinite, both when we wake
And when we seek, as now, thy gift of sleep."

DIDACTIC PIECES.

Section I.

NOTHING FORMED IN VAIN.

part

Let no presuming impious railer tax
Creative wisdom, as if ought was form'd
In vain, or not for admirable ends.
Shall little haughty Ignorance pronounce
His works unwise, of which the smallest
Exceeds the narrow vision of her mind!
As if, upon a full proportion'd dome,
On swelling columns heav'd, the pride of art!
A critic-fly, whose feeble ray scarce spreads
An inch around, with blind presumption bold
nouid dare to tax the structure of the whole!
And lives the man, whose universal eye"

ལ·

Has swept at once the unbounded scheme of things:
Mark'd their dependance so, and firm accord,
As with unfaultering accent to conclude,
That this availeth nought! Has any seen
The mighty chain of beings, lessening down
From infinite perfection, to the brink
Of dreary nothing, desolate abyss!

From which astonish'd thought, recoiling, turns!
Till then alone let zealous praise ascend,
And hymns of holy wonder, to that POWER,
Whose wisdom shines as lovely in our minds,
As on our smiling eyes his servant sun.

Section II.

INDIGNANT SENTIMENTS ON NATIONAL PREJUDICES AND HATRED; AND ON SLAVERY.

Oh for a lodge in some vast wilderness,
Some boundless contiguity of shade,
Where rumour of oppression and deceit,
Of unsuccessful or successful war,

Might never reach me more. My ear is pain'd,
My soul is sick with every day's report

Of wrong and outrage with which earth is fill'd.
There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart,

The natural bond

It does not feel for man.
Of brotherhood is sever'd as the flax
That falls asunder at the touch of fire.

He finds his fellow guilty of a skin

44

prey.

Not colour'd like his own; and having power
To enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause
Dooms and devotes him as his lawful
Lands intersected by a narrow frith
Abhor each other. Mountains interpos'd,
Makes enemies of nations, who had else,
Like kindred drops, been mingled into one.
Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys;
And worse than all, and most to be deplor'd,
As human Nature's broadest, foulest blot,
Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat
With stripes, that Mercy, with a bleeding heart,
Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast.
Then what is man? and what man seeing this,
And having human feelings, does not blush
And hang his head, to think himself a man?
I would not have a slave to till my ground,
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep,

And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth
The sinews bought and sold have ever earn'd.
No dear as freedom is, and in my heart's
Just estimation priz'd above all price;

372

I had much rather be myself the slave,

And wear the bonds, that fasten them on him.
We have no slaves at home-then why abroad?
And they themselves once ferried o'er the waves
That part us, are emancipate and loos'd.

Slaves cannot breath in England; if their lungs
Receive our air, that moment they are free;
They touch our country, and their shackles fall.
That's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud
And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then,
And let it circulate through ev'ry vein.
Of all your empire, that where Britain's power
Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too.

Section III.

REFLECTIONS ON A FUTURE STATE,
FROM A REVIEW OF WINTER.

Tis done! dread Winter spreads his latest glooms,
And reigns tremendous o'er the conquer'd year.
How dead the vegetable kingdom lies!

How dumb the tuneful! Horror wide extends
His desolate domain. Behold, fond man!
See here thy pictur'd life: pass some few years,
Thy flowering spring, thy summer's ardent strength
Thy sober autumn fading into age,

And pale concluding winter comes at last,

And shuts the scene.

Ah! whither now are fled,
Those dreams of greatness? those unsolid hopes
Of happiness? those longings after fame?

Those restless cares? those busy bustling days?
Those gay-spent, festive nights? those veering the
Lost between good and ill, that shar'd thy life?
All now are vanish'd! Virtue sole survives,
Immortal never-failing friend of man,
His guide to happiness on high. And see!
'Tis come, the glorious morn! the second birth

Of heaven, and earth! awakening Nature hears
The new created world; and starts to life,
In every heightened form, from pain and death
For ever free. The great eternal scheme,
Involving all, and in a perfect whole
Uniting as the prospect wider spreads,
To Reason's eye refin'd clears up apace.
Ye vainly wise! Ye blind presumptious! now,
Confounded in the dust, adore that Power,
And Wisdom oft arraign'd: see now the cause
Why unassuming Worth in secret liv'd,
And died neglected: why the good man's share
In life was gall and bitterness of soul:
Why the lone widow and her orphans pin'd
In starving solitude; while Luxury,

In palaces, lay straining her low thought,
To form unreal wants: why heaven born Truth,
And Moderation fair, wore the red marks
Of Superstition's scourge: why licens'd Pain,
That cruel spoiler, that embosom'd foe,
Imbitter'd all our bliss. Ye good distress'd!
Ye noble few! who here unbending stand
Beneath life's pressure, yet bear up a while,
And what your bounded view, which only saw
A little part, deem'd evil, is no more :
The storms of wintry time will quickly pass,
And one unbounded spring encircle all.

Section IV.

ON VERSIFICATION.

Many by Number judge a Poet's song;
And smooth or rough, with them, is right or wrong;
In the bright Muse though thousand charms conspire,
Her voice is all these tuneful fools admire ;
Who haunt Parnassus but to please their ear,
Not mend their minds, as some to Church repair
Not for the doctrine, but the music there.

G g

« PreviousContinue »