Each moment of each day; to flatter bad
Thro' dread of worie; to cling to this rude rock,
Barren to them of good, and tharp with ills,
And hourly blacken'd with impending storins,
And infamous for wrecks of human hope
Scar'd at the gloomy gulph, that yawns beneath.
Such are their triumphs! fuch their pangs of joy!
'Tis time, high time, to thift this difmal scene. This hugg'd, this hideous state, what art can cure? One only; but that one, what all may reach; Virtue She, wonder-working goddess! charms That rock to bloom; and tames the painted forew; And, what will more furprise, LORENZO! gives To life's fick, nauseous iteration, change; And streightens Nature's circle to a line.' Believ'it thou this, LORENZO? lend an ear, A patient ear, thou'lt blush to difbelieve. A languid, leaden iteration reigns, And ever must, o'er those whose joys are joys Of fight, smell, taste: the cuckow-seasons fing The fame dull note to fuch as nothing prize, But what those seasons, from the teeming earth, To doating sense indulge. But nobler minds, Which relish fruits unripen'd by the fun, Make their days various; various as the dyes On the dove's neck, which wanton in his rays. On minds of dove-like innocence poffeft, On light'ned minds, that bask in virtue's beams, Nothing hangs tedious, nothing old revolves In that, for which they long, for which they live. Their glorious efforts, wing'd with heav'nly hope, Each rifing morning fees still higher rife; Each bounteous dawn its novelty presents To worth maturing, new strength, luftre, fame; While Nature's circle, like a chariot-wheel, Rolling beneath their elevated aims, Makes their fair prospect fairer ev'ry hour; Advancing virtue in a line to bliss; Virtue, which Chriftian motives best inspire! And bliss, which Chriftian schemes alone enfure! And thall we them, for virtue's fake, commence
Apoftates, and turn infidels for joy?
" He fins against this life who flights the next."
What is this life? how few their fav'rite know?
Fond in the dark, and blind in our embrace,
By patlionately loving life, we make
Lov'd life unlovely; hugging her to death.
We give to time eternity's regard;
And, dreaming, take our passage for our port.
Life has no value as an end, but means;
An end deplorable! a means divine !
When 'tis our all, 'tis nothing; worse than nought;
A nest of pains; when held as nothing, much :
Like some fair hum'rifts, life is most enjoy'd,
When courted least; most worth, when difesteem'd;
Then 'tis the feat of comfort, rich in peace;
In prospect richer far; important! awful!
Not to be mention'd, but with shouts of praise!
Not to be thought on, but with tides of joy !
The mighty basis of eternal bliss !
Where now the barren rock! the painted forew?
Where now, LORENZO! life's eternal round
Have I not made my triple promise good?
Vain is the world; but only to the vain.
To what compare we then this varying scene,
Whose worth ambiguous rises and declines?
Waxes and wanes? (in all propitious, night
Allifts me here) compare it to the moon;
Dark in herself, and indigent; but rich
In borrow'd luftre from a higher sphere:
When grofs guilt interposes, lab'ring earth
O'ershadow'd, mourns a deep eclipse of joy;
Her joys, at brightest, pallid to that font
Of full effulgent glory, whence they flow.
Nor is that glory diftant: O LORENZO!
A good man, and an angel! these between
How thin the barrier? what divides their fate?
Perhaps a moment, or perhaps a year;
Or, if an age, it is a moment still;
A moment, or eternity's forgot.
Then be, what once they were, who now are gods;
Be what PHILANDER was, and claim the skies.
Starts timid Nature at the gloomy pass?
The soft tranfition call it; and be chear'd:
Such it is often, and why not to thee?
To hope the best is pious, brave, and wife,
And may itself procure, what it prefumes.
Life is much flatter'd, death is much traduc'd;
Compare the rivals, and the kinder crown.
"Strange competition!" -True, LORENZO! strange!
So little life can cast into the scale.
Life makes the foul dependent on the dust;
Death gives her wings to mount above the spheres.
Thro' chinks, stil'd organs, dim life peeps at light;
Death bursts th' involving cloud, and all is day;
All eye, all ear, the disembody'd power.
Death has feign'd evils, Nature shall not feel;
Life, ills suostantial, Wisdom cannot shun.
Is not the mighty Mind, that son of Heaven!
By tyrant Life dethron'd, imprifon'd, pain'd!
By Death enlarg'd, ennobled, deify'd?
Death but entombs the body; Life the foul.
" Is Death then guiltless? How he marks his way "With dreadful waste of what deserves to shine! "Art, genius, fortune, elevated power! " With various luftres these light up the world, "Which Death puts out, and darkens human race." I grant, LORENZO! this indictment just : The fage, peer, potentate, king, conqueror! Death humbles these; more barbrous Life, the man. Life is the triumph of our mould'ring clay; Death, of the spirit infinite! divine! Death has no dread, but what frail Life imparts; Nor Life true joy, but what kind Death improves. No blifs has Life to boaft, till Death can give Far greater; Life's a debtor to the grave, Dark lattice! letting in eternal day.
LORENZO! bluth at fondness for a life,
Which fends celeftial fouls on errands vile,
To cater for the sense; and serve at boards,
Where ev'ry ranger of the wilds, perhaps
Each reptile, justly claims our upper hand.
Luxurious feaft! a foul, a foul immortal,
In all the dainties of a brute bemir'd!
LORENZO! blush at terror for a death,
Which gives thee to repose in festive bowers,
Where nectars sparkle, angels minifter,
And more than angels share, and raise, and crown,
And eternise the birth, bloom, bursts of bliss.
O feast indeed luxurious! Earth, vile earth!
In all the glories of a God array'd!
What need I more? O Death, the palm is thino.
Then welcome, Death; thy dreaded harbingers,
Age and Disease; Disease, though long my guest;
That plucks my nerves, those tender strings of life;
Which, pluckt a little more, will toll the bell
That calls my few friends to my funeral;
Where feeble Nature drops, perhaps, a tear,
While Reason and Religion, better taught,
Congratulate the dead, and crown his tomb
With wreath triumphant. Death is victory;
It binds in chains the raging ills of Life;
Lust and Ambition, Wrath and Avarice,
Dragg'd at his chariot-wheel, applaud his power.
That ills corrofive, cares importunate,
Are not immortal too, O Death! is thine.
Our day of diffoluion!-name it right;
'Tis our great pay-day; 'tis our harvest, rich
And ripe: what tho' the fickle, sometimes keen,
Just scars us, as we reap the golden grain?
More than thy balm, O Gilead! heals the wound.
Birth's feeble cry, and Death's deep dismal groan,
Are lender tributes low-tax'd Nature pays
For mighty gain; the gain of each a life!
But O! the last the former so tranfcends,
Life dies, compar'd; Life lives beyond the grave.
And feel I, Death! no joy from thought of thee?
Death, the great counfellor, who man inspires
With ev'ry nobler thought, and fairer deed!
Death, the deliverer, who refcues man!
Death, the rewarder, who the rescu'd crowns!
Death, that absolves my birth; a curse without it!
Rich Death, that realizes all my cares,
Toils, virtues, hopes; without it, a chimera!
Death, of all pain the period, not of joy;
Joy's fource, and subject, still fubfift unhurt;
One, in my foul; and one, in her great Sire;
Tho' the four winds were warring for my dutt.
Yes, and from winds and waves, and central night,
Tho' prison'd there, my dust too I reclaim,
(To duft when drop proud Nature's proudest spheres)
And live entire. Death is the crown of life.
Were death deny'd, poor man would live in vain;
Were death deny'd, to live would not be life :
Were death deny'd, ev'n fools would wish to die.
Death wounds to cure; we fall; we rise; we reign!
Spring from our fetters, fasten in the skies;
Where blooming Eden withers in our fight :
Death gives us more than was in Eden loft,
This king of terrors is the prince of peace.
When shall I die to vanity, pain, death?
When shall I die when shall I live for ever?
|