A richer pasture, and a larger range;
And sense, by right divine, ascends the throne.
When Virtue's prize and prospect are no more,
Virtue no more we think the will of Heaven.
Would Heaven quite beggar Virtue, if beloved?

1165

'Has Virtue charms?'--I grant her heavenly fair ; But if unportion'd, all will Interest wed,

1170

And hopes and fears give Conscience all her power.
As in the dying parent dies the child,

Virtue with Immortality expires.

Who tells me he denies his soul immortal,
Whate'er his boast, has told me he's a knave.
His duty 'tis to love himself alone,
Nor care though mankind perish if he smiles.
Who thinks ere long the man shall wholly die
Is dead already; nought but brute survives.

1180

1186

And are there such? Such candidates there are
For more than death; for utter loss of being;
Being, the basis of the Deity!

Ask you the cause ?--the cause they will not tell;
Nor need they. Oh, the sorceries of sense!
They work this transformation on the soul,
Dismount her like the serpent at the fall,
Dismount her from her native wing (which soar'd
Erewhile ethereal heights,) and throw her down
To lick the dust, and crawl in such a thought.

1190

Is it in words to paint you? O ye Fallen! Fallen from the wings of reason and of hope!

1195

Erect in stature, prone in appetite!

Patrons of pleasure, posting into pain!

Lovers of argument, averse to sense!

Boasters of liberty! fast bound in chains!

1200

Lords of the wide creation, and the shame!

More senseless than the' irrationals you scorn! More base than those you rule than those you pity Far more undone! O ye most infamous

Of beings, from superior dignity!

Deepest in woe, from means of boundless bliss!

Ye cursed by blessings infinite! because

1205

Most highly favour'd, most profoundly lost!
Ye motley mass of contradiction strong'

And are you, too, convinced your souls fly off
In exhalation soft, and die in air,

1210

From the full flood of evidence against you?

In the coarse drudgeries and sinks of sense,

Your souls have quite worn out the make of Heaven,

By vice new cast, and creatures of your own;

1215

But though you can deform, you can't destroy:

To curse, not uncreate, is all your power.

Lorenzo! this black brotherhood renounce; Renounce St. Evremond, and read St. Paul, Ere rapp'd by miracle, by reason wing'd,

1220

His mounting mind made long abode in Heaven.

This is freethinking, unconfined to parts,

To send the soul, on curious travel bent,

Through all the provinces of human thought;

To dart her flight through the whole sphere of man ;

Of this vast universe to make the tour;

1226

In each recess of space and time at home,

Familiar with their wonders; diving deep;

And, like a prince of boundless interests there,

Still most ambitious of the most remote ;

1230

To look on truth unbroken and entire ;

Truth in the system, the full orb; where truths
By truths enlighten'd and sustain'd, afford
An archlike strong foundation, to support
The' incumbent weight of absolute complete
Conviction: here, the more we press, we stand
More firm who most examine, most believe.
Parts, like half-sentences, confound; the whole
Conveys the sense, and God is understood,

1235

1240

Who not in fragments writes to human race:
Read his whole volume, sceptic! then reply.
This, this is thinking free, a thought that grasps
Beyond a grain, and looks beyond an hour.
Turn up thine eye, survey this midnight scene;
What are earth's kingdoms to yon boundless orbs, 1245
Of human souls, one day, the destined range?
And what yon boundless orbs to godlike man?
Those numerous worlds that throng the firmament,
And ask more space in Heaven, can roll at large
In man's capacious thought, and still leave room 1250
For ampler orbs, for now creations there.
Can such a soul contract itself, to gripe
A point of no dimension, of no weight?

It can; it does: the world is such a point;
And of that point how small a part enslaves!

1255

How small a part-of nothing, shall I say? Why not?-Friends, our chief treasure, how they drop! Lucia, Narcissa fair, Philander, gone! The grave, like fabled Cerberus, has oped

A triple mouth, and in an awful voice

Loud calls my soul, and utters all I sing.
How the world falls to pieces round about us,
And leaves us in a ruin of our joy!

What says this transportation of my friends?

1260

It bids me love the place where now they dwell, 1265 And scorn this wretched spot they leave so poor. Eternity's vast ocean lies before thee;

There, there, Lorenzo! thy Clarissa sails.
Give thy mind sea-room; keep it wide of earth,
That rock of souls immortal; cut thy cord;
Weigh anchor; spread thy sails; call every wind

1270

Eye thy great Pole-star; make the land of Life'
Two kinds of life has double-natured man,
And two of death; the last far more severe.
Life animal is nurtured by the Sun,

1275

Thrives on his bounties, triumphs in his beams :
Life rational subsists on higher food,

Triumphant in His beams who made the day :
When we leave that Sun, and are left by this
(The fate of all who die in stubborn guilt,)
'Tis utter darkness; strictly double death.
We sink by no judicial stroke of Heaven,
But nature's course; as sure as plummets fall.
Since God or man must alter ere they meet,

1280

(Since light and darkness blend not in our sphere) 1285 "Tis manifest, Lorenzo, who must change.

If, then, that double death should prove thy lot, Blame not the bowels of the Deity;

Man shall be bless'd, as far as man permits
Not man alone, all rationals Heaven arms
With an illustrious, but tremendous power,
To counteract its own most gracious ends,
And this of strict necessity, not choice;

1290

That power denied, men, angels, were no more
But passive engines, void of praise or blame.

1295

A nature rational implies the power

Of being bless'd or wretched, as we please;

Else idle Reason would have nought to do,

And he that would be barr'd capacity

Of pain, courts incapacity of bliss.

1300

Heaven wills our happiness, allows our doom,
Invites us ardently, but not compels ;

Heaven but persuades, almighty man decrees.

Man is the maker of immortal fates.

Man falls by man, if finally he falls;

1305

And fall he must, who learns from death alone

The dreadful secret,-that he lives for ever.

Why this to thee ?-thee yet, perhaps, in doubt
Of second life? but wherefore doubtful still?
Eternal life is Nature's ardent wish;
What ardently we wish we soon believe.
Thy tardy faith declares that wish destroy'd:
What has destroy'd it ?--shall I tell thee what?
When fear'd the future, 'tis no longer wish'd;
And when unwish'd, we strive to disbelieve.

1310

1315

Thus Infidelity our guilt betrays.'

Nor that the sole detection! Blush, Lorenzo !

Blush for hypocrisy, if not for gailt.

The future fear'd ?-An infidel, and fear?

Fear what? a dream? a fable?-How thy dread, 132
Unwilling evidence, and therefore strong,
Afforis ny cause an undesign'd support!
How Disbelief affirms what it denies !
'It, unawares, asserts immortal life.'-
Surprising Infidelity turns out

A creed and a confession of our sins:
Apostates, thus, are orthodox divines.

1325

Lorenzo! with Lorenzo clash no more, Nor longer a transparent vizor wear. Think'st thou Religion only has her mask? Our infidels are Satan's hypocrites,

1330

Pretend the worst, and, at the bottom, fail.

When visited by thought (thought will intrude,)

Like him they serve, they tremble and believe.
Is there hypocrisy so foul as this?

1335

So fatal to the welfare of the world?

What detestation, what contempt, their due!

And, if unpaid, be thank'd for their escape,

That Christian candour they strive hard to scorn.

If not for that asylum, they might find

1340

A hell on earth, nor scape a worse below

With insolence and impotence of thought, Instead of racking fancy to refute,

Reform thy manners, and the truth enjoy.-

But shall I dare confess the dire result?

1345

Can thy proud reason brook so black a brand?