Hasten the welcome end of all my pains. Manoah. Wilt thou then serve the Philistines with that gift Which was expressly given thee to annoy them? Cause light again within thy eyes to spring, That these dark orbs no more shall treat with light, But yield to double darkness nigh at hand: Manoah. Believe not these suggestions, which proceed From anguish of the mind and humours black, That mingle with thy fancy. I however By ransom, or how else: mean while be calm, And healing words from these thy friends admit, [Exit.] Samson. O that Torment should not be confin'd To the body's wounds and sores, With maladies innumerable In heart, head, breast, and reins; But must secret passage find To the inmost mind, Their exercise all his fierce accidents, And on her purest spirits prey, As on entrails, joints, and limbs, With answerable pains, but more intense, Though void of corporal sense. My griefs not only pain me As a lingering disease, But, finding no redress, ferment and rage; Nor less than wounds immedicable Rankle, and fester, and gangrene, To black mortification. Thoughts, my tormenters, arm'd with deadly stings, Mangle my apprehensive tenderest parts, Exasperate, exulcerate, and raise Dire inflammation, which no cooling herb Nor breath of vernal air from snowy Alp, To death's benumming opium as my only cure: And sense of Heaven's desertion. I was his nursling once, and choice delight, His destin'd from the womb, Promis'd by heavenly message twice descending. Under his special eye Abstemious I grew up, and thriv'd amain; He led me on to mightiest deeds, Above the nerve of mortal arm, Against the uncircumcis'd, our enemies : Whom I by his appointment had provok'd, The close of all my miseries, and the balm. Chorus. Many are the sayings of the wise, In ancient and in modern books inroll❜d, Extolling patience as the truest fortitude; And to the bearing well of all calamities, All chances incident to man's frail life, Consolatories writ With studied argument, and much persuasion sought Lenient of grief and anxious thought: But with the afflicted in his pangs their sound Little prevails, or rather seems a tune Harsh, and of dissonant mood from his complaint; Unless he feel within Some source of consolation from above, Secret refreshings, that repair his strength, And fainting spirits uphold. God of our fathers, what is man! That thou towards him with hand so various, Or might I say contrarious, Temper❜st thy providence through his short course, Not evenly, as thou rul'st The angelick Orders, and inferior creatures mute, Irrational and brute. Nor do I name of men the common rout, That wandering loose about Grow up and perish, as the summer-fly, And people's safety, which in part they effect: Changest thy countenance, and thy hand, with no regard Of highest favours past From thee on them, or them to thee of service. To life obscur'd, which were a fair dismission, Unseemly falls in human eye, Too grievous for the trespass or omission; Oft leav'st them to the hostile sword Of Heathen and profane, their carcasses To dogs and fowls a prey, or else captiv'd; With sickness and disease thou bow'st them down, In crude old age: Though not disordinate, yet causeless suffering For oft alike both come to evil end. So deal not with this once thy glorious champion, The image of thy strength, and mighty minister. What do I beg? how hast thou dealt already! Behold him in his state calamitous, and turn His labours, for thou canst, to peaceful end. |