To tell the rational, who gazes on it,—
Though that immensely great, still greater he
Whose breast capricious, can embrace and lodge,
Unburden'd, Nature's universal scheme;
Can grasp Creation with a single thought;
Creation grasp, and not exclude its Sire.'-
To tell him farther-It behoves him much
To guard the' important, yet depending fate
Of being brighter than a thousand suns;
One single ray of thought outshines them all.'—
And if man hears obedient, soon he'll soar
Superior heights, and on his purple wing,
His purple wing bedropp'd with eyes of gold,
Rising, where thought is now denied to rise,
Look down triumphant on these dazzling spheres.
Why then persist ?-no mortal ever lived
But, dying, he pronounced (when words are true)
The whole that charms thee absolutely vain;
Vain, and far worse!-Think thou with dying men ;
O condescend to think as angels think!
O tolerate a chance for happiness!
Our nature such, ill choice insures ill fate;
And hell had been, though there had been no God.
Dost thou not know, my new Astronomer!
Earth, turning from the Sun, brings night to man?
Man, turning from his God, brings endless night;
Where thou canst read no morals, find no friend, 2011
Amend no manners, and expect no peace.
How deep the darkness! and the groan how loud!
And far, how far, from lambent are the flames!-
Such is Lorenzo's purchase! such his praise!
The proud, the politic Lorenzo's praise ;
Though in his ear, and level'd at his heart,
I've half read o'er the volume of the skies.
For think not thou hast heard all this from me; My song but echoes what great Nature speaks. 2020 What has she spoken ?-Thus the goddess spoke, Thus speaks for ever :- Place at Nature's head,
A Sovereign which o'er all things rolls his eye,
Extends his wing, promulgates his commands,
But, above all, diffuses endless good;
To whom, for sure redress, the wrong'd may fly,
The vile for mercy, and the pain'd for peace;
By whom the various tenants of these spheres,
Diversified in fortunes, place, and powers,
Raised in enjoyment, as in worth they rise,
Arrive at length (if worthy such approach)
At that bless'd fountain-head from which they stream,
Where conflict past redoubles present joy,
And present joy looks forward on increase,
And that on more; no period! every step
A double boon! a promise and a bliss.'
How easy sits this scheme on human hearts!
It suits their make, it sooths their vast desires;
Passion is pleased, and Reason asks no more :
'Tis rational; 'tis great!-but what is thine?
It darkens! shocks! excruciates! and confounds!
Leaves us quite naked, both of help and hope,
Sinking from bad to worse; few years the sport
Of Fortune, then the morsel of despair.
Say, then, Lorenzo! (for thou know'st it well) 2045 What's vice? mere want of compass in our thought. Religion what?—the proof of common sense. How art thou hooted where the least prevails!
Is it my fault if these truths call thee fool?
Ana thou shalt never be miscall'd by me.
Can neither Shame nor Terror stand thy friend?
And art thou still an insect in the inire?
How like thy guardian angel have I flown;
Snatch'd thee from earth, escorted thee through all
The' ethereal armies; walk'd thee, like a god,
Through splendours of first magnitude, arranged
On either hand; clouds thrown beneath thy feet;
Close-cruised on the bright paradise of God,
And almost introduced thee to the throne!
And art thou still carousing, for delight,
Rank poison, first fermenting to mere froth,
And then subsiding into final gall?
To beings of sublime, immortal make,
How shocking is all joy whose end is sure!
Such joy more shocking still, the more it charms!
And dost thou choose what ends ere well begun, 2066
And infamous as short? and dost thou choose
(Thou, to whose palate glory is so sweet)
To wade into perdition through contempt,
Not of poor bigots only, but thy own?
For I have peep'd into thy cover'd heart,
And seen it blush beneath a boastful brow?
For by strong Guilt's most violent assault,
Conscience is but disabled, not destroy'd.
O thou most awful being! and most vain!
Thy will how frail! how glorious is thy power?
Though dread Eternity has sown her seeds
Of bliss and woe in thy despotic breast;
Though heaven and hell depend upon thy choice,
A butterfly comes cross, and both are fled.
Is this the picture of a rational?
This horrid image, shall it be more just?
Lorenzo! no; it cannot,-shall not be,
If there is force in reason; or in sounds
Chanted beneath the glimpses of the moon,
When Slumber locks the general lip, and dreams,
A magic, at this planetary hour,
Through senseless mazes, hunts souls uninspired.
Attend the sacred mysteries begin
My solemn night-born adjuration hear:
Hear, and I'll raise thy spirit from the dust,
While the stars gaze on this enchantment new;
Enchantment not infernal, but divine!
By Silence, Death's peculiar attribute;
By Darkness, Guilt's inevitable doom;
By Darkness and by Silence, sisters dread!
That draw the curtain round Night's ebon throne,
And raise ideas solemn as the scene!
By Night, and all of awful Night presents
To thought or sense (of awful much, to both
The goddess brings!) By these her trembling fires.
Like Vesta's, ever-burning, and, like hers,
Sacred to thoughts immaculate and pure!
By these bright orators that prove and praise,
And press thee to revere the Deity;
Perhaps, too, aid thee, when revered, a while
To reach his throne, as stages of the soul,
Through which, at different periods, she shall pass,
Refining gradual, for her final height,
And purging off some dross at every sphere!
By this dark pall thrown o'er the silent world!
By the world's kings and kingdoms most renown'd,
From short Ambition's zenith set for ever,
Sad presage to vain boasters, now in bloom!
By the long list of swift mortality,
From Adam downward to this evening knell,
Which midnight waves in Fancy's startled eye,
And shocks her with a hundred centuries,
Round Death's black banner throng'd in human thought
By thousands, now, resigning their last breath, 2120
And calling thee-wert thou so wise to hear!
By tombs o'er tombs arising, human earth
Ejected, to make room for-human earth,
The monarch's terror! and the sexton's trade!
By pompous obsequies that shun the day,
The torch funereal, and the nodding plume,
Which makes poor man's humiliation proud,
Boast of our ruin! triumph of our dust!
By the damp vault that weeps o'er royal bones,
And the pale iamp that shows the ghastly dead, 2130
More ghastly through the thick incumbent gloom!
By visits (if there are) from darker scenes,
The gliding spectre! and the groaning grove!
By groans, and graves, and miseries that groan
For the grave's shelter! By desponding men,
Senseless to pains of death from pangs of guilt!
By Guilt's last audit! By yon moon in blood,
The rocking firmament, the falling stars,
And thunder's last discharge, great Nature's knell! By second Chaos, and eternal Night,-
Be wise-nor let Philander blame my charm;
But own not ill discharged my double debt,
Love to the living, duty to the dead.
For know I'm but executor; he left
This moral legacy; I make it o'er
By his command: Philander hear in me,
And Heaven in both.-If deaf to these, oh! hear
Florello's tender voice; his weal depends
On thy resolve; it trembles at thy choice;
For his sake-love thyself: example strikes
All human hearts; a bad example more;
More still a father's; that insures his ruin.
As parent of his being, wouldst thou prove
The' unnatural parent of his miseries,
And make him curse the being which thou gavest?
Is this the blessing of so fond a father?
If careless of Lorenzo, spare, oh! spare
Florello's father, and Philander's friend!
To reason, and persuade thee to be-bless'd.
This seems not a request to be denied ; Yet (such the' infatuation of mankind!)
Tis the most hopeless man can make to man.
Shall I then rise in argument and warmth ?
And urge Philander's posthumous advice,
From topics yet unbroach'd?
But, oh! I faint! my spirits fail! nor strange!
So long on wing, and in no middle clime!
To which my great Creator's glory call'd;
And calls-but, now, in vain. Sleep's dewy wand
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