And Death's dark shadows fly the gospel-sun.
They spoke what nothing but immortal souls
Could speak and thus the truth they question'd

proved.

'Can, then, absurdities, as well as crimes,

Speak man immortal?' All things speak him so.

600

Much has been urged; and dost thou call for more ? Call, and with endless questions be distress'd,

All unresolvable, if earth is all.

'Why life, a moment? infinite, desire?

605

Our wish, eternity? our home, the grave?

Heaven's promise dormant lies in human hope;
Who wishes life immortal proves it too.

Why happiness pursued, though never found!

610

Man's thirst of happiness declares it is
(For Nature never gravitates to nought);
That thirst unquench'd, declares It is not here.
My Lucia, thy Clarissa, call to thought;
Why cordial friendship riveted so deep,
As hearts to pierce at first, at parting rend,
If friend and friendship vanish in an hour?
Is not this torment in the mask of joy?
Why by reflection marr'd the joys of sense?
Why past and future preying on our hearts,
And putting all our presént joys to death?
Why labours Reason? Instinct were as well;
Instinct far better: what can choose can err.
O how infallible the thoughtless brute !
"Twere well his Holiness were half as sure.
Reason with Inclination why at war
Why sense of guilt? why conscience up in arms?

615

620

625

Conscience of guilt is prophecy of pain,

And bosom-counsel to decline the blow.
Reason with Inclination ne'er had jarr'd,
If nothing future paid forbearance here.

630

Thus on-these, and a thousand pleas uncall'd,

All promise, some insure, a second scene;
Which, were it doubtful, would be dearer far

Than all things else most certain were it false, 635

What truth on earth so precious as the lie?

This world it gives us, let what will ensue ;
This world it gives in that high cordial, hope;

The future of the present is the soul.

How this life groans, when sever'd from the next! 640
Poor mutilated wretch, that disbelieves !

By dark distrust his being cut in two,
In both parts perishes; life void of joy.
Sad prelude of eternity in pain !

Couldst thou persuade me the next life could fail 645 Our ardent wishes, how should I pour out

My bleeding heart in anguish, new as deep!
Oh! with what thoughts thy hope, and my despair
Abhorr'd Annihilation! blasts the soul,

And wide extends the bounds of human woe!
Could I believe Lorenzo's system true,

In this black channel would my ravings run :—
'Grief from the future borrow'd peace, erewhile.
The future vanish'd! and the present pain'd?
Strange import of unprecedented ill!

Fall how profound! like Lucifer's the fall!
Unequal fate! his fall, without his guilt!
From where fond Hope built her pavilion high,
The gods among, hurl'd headlong, hurl'd at once
To night! to nothing! darker still than night!
If 'twas a dream, why wake me my worst foe,
Lorenzo boastful of the name of friend!.

O for delusion! O for error still!

650

G55

660

Could vengeance strike much stronger than to plant A thinking being in a world like this,

665

Not over rich before, now beggar'd quite,
More cursed than at the fall!-The Sun goes out!
The thorns shoot up! what thorns in every thought!
Why sense of better? it imbitters worse.

670

Why sense? why life? if but to sigh, then sink
To what I was! twice nothing! and much woe!
Woe from Heaven's bounties! woe from what was won'
To flatter most, high intellectual powers.
Thought, virtue, knowledge! blessings, by thy scheme

All poison'd into pains. First, knowledge, once
My soul's ambition, now her greatest dread.
To know myself, true wisdom?—No, to shun
That shocking science, parent of Despair!
Avert thy mirror; if I see, I die.

675

'Know my Creator? climb his bless'd abode
By painful speculation, pierce the vail,
Dive in his nature, read his attributes,
And gaze in admiration--on a foe,
Obtruding life, withholding happiness!
From the full rivers that surround his throne,
Not letting fall one drop of joy on man ;

680

685

Man gasping for one drop, that he might cease
To curse his birth, nor envy reptiles more!
Ye sable clouds! ye darkest shades of night!
Hide him, for ever hide him, from my thought,
Once all my comfort, source and soul of joy!

690

Now leagued with furies, and with thee,* against me. 'Know his achievements? study his renown? Contemplate this amazing Universe,

Dropp'd from his hand with miracles repleto! 695 For what? mid miracles of nobler name,

To find one miracle of misery?

To find the being, which alone can know

And praise his works, a blemish on his praise!

Through Nature's ample range, in thought to stroll,
And start at man, the single mourner there,
Breathing high hope! chain'd down to pangs and death!
'Knowing is suffering and shall Virtue share

701

The sigh of Knowledge ?-Virtue shares the sigh
By straining up the steep of excellent,
By battles fought, and from temptation won,

705

What gains she but the pang of seeing worth,
Angelic worth, soon shuffled in the dark

With every vice, and swept to brutal dust?
Merit is madness, virtue is a crime,

710

A crime to reason, if it costs us pain

* Lorenzo.

Unpaid what pain, amidst a thousand more,
To think the most abandon'd, after days
Of triumph o'er their betters, find in death
As soft a pillow, nor make fouler clay!

'Duty! religica!-these, our duty done,
Imply reward. Religion is mistake.
Duty-there's none, but to repel the cheat.
Ye cheats away: ye daughters of my pride,

715

Who feign yourselves the favourites of the skies, 720
Ye towering hopes! abortive energies!

That toss and struggle in my lying breast,

To scale the skies, and build presumptions there,

As I wore heir of an eternity.

Vain, vain ambitions! trouble me no more.

Why travel far in quest of sure defeat?

725

As bounded as my being be my wish.

All is inverted, Wisdom is a fool.

Sense take the rein; blind Passion! drive us on;

And, Ignorance! befriend us on our way;

730

Ye new, but truest patrons of our peace!

Yes, give the pulse full empire; live the brute,

Since as the brute we die: the sum of man,

Of godlike man! to revel and to rot.

'But not on equal terms with other brutes;

735

Their revels a more poignant relish yield,

And safer too; they never poisons choose.

Instinct than Reason makes more wholesome meals,
And sends all-marring Murmur far away.
For sensual life they best philosophize,
Theirs that serene the sages sought in vain:
'Tis man alone expostulates with Heaven;
His all the power and all the cause to mourn.
Shall human eyes alone dissolve in tears?
And bleed in anguish none but human hearts?
The wide-stretch'd realm of intellectual woe,
Surpassing sensual far, is all our own.
In life so fatally distinguish'd, why

740

745

Cast in one lot, confounded, lump'd in death?

750

'Ere yet in being, was mankind in guilt? Why thunder'd this peculiar clause against us, "All-mortal, and all-wretched!"-Have the skies Reasons of state their subjects may not scan, Nor humbly reason when they sorely sigh ?— "All-mortal and all-wretched!"-'Tis too much, 755 Unparallel'd in Nature: 'tis too much,

On being unrequested at thy hands,
Omnipotent! for I see nought but power.

'And why see that? why thought! To toil and eat, Then make our bed in darkness, needs no thought. 760 What superfluities are reasoning souls!

Oh! give eternity, or thought destroy.

But without thought our curse were half unfelt;

Its blunted edge would spare the throbbing heart,

And therefore 'tis bestow'd. I thank thee, Reason!

For aiding Life's too small calamities,

And giving being to the dread of death.

Such are thy bounties !-Was it then too much

For me to trespass on the brutal rights?

766

Too much for Heaven to make one emmet more? 770 Too much for Chaos to permit my mass

A longer stay with essences unwrought,

Unfashion'd, untormented into man?

Wretched preferment to this round of pains!
Wretched capacity of frenzy, thought!

Wretched capacity of dying, life!

775

Life, Thought, Worth, Wisdom, all (O foul revolt') Once friends to peace gone over to the foe.

'Death, then, has changed its nature too. O Death! Come to my bosom, thou best gift of Heaven! Best friend of man! since man is man no more. Why in this thorny wilderness so long, Since there's no promised land's ambrosial bower, To pay me with its honey for my stings' If needful to the selfish schemes of Heaven

780

785

To sting us sore, why mock'd our misery?

Why this so sumptuous insult o'er our heads?