Puslapio vaizdai
PDF
„ePub“

The conscious forest trembles at the shock,
And hill, and stream, and distant dale resound.

These high-aim'd darts of death, and these
alone,

Should I collect, my quiver would be full;
A quiver which, suspended in mid air,
Or near heav'n's archer, in the zodiac, hung,
(So could it be) should draw the public eye,
The gaze and contemplation of mankind!
A constellation awful, yet benign,

To guide the gay, through life's tempestuous wave,
Nor suffer them to strike the common rock;
From greater danger to grow more secure,
And wrapt in happiness, forget their fate.' مید
Lysander, happy past the common lot,
Was warn'd of danger, but too gay to fear.
He wooed the fair Aspasia; she was kind:
In youth, form, fortune, fame, they both were

bless'd:

All who knew envied, yet in envy lov'd;
Can fancy form more finish'd happiness?
Fix'd was the nuptial hour. Her stately dome
Rose on the sounding beach. The glitt'ring

spires

Float in the wave, and break against the shore:
To break those glitt'ring shadows, human joys.
The faithless morning smiled: he takes his leave
To re-embrace, in ecstasies, at eve.
The rising storm forbids. The news arrives;
Untold she saw it in her servant's eye.
She felt it seen (her heart was apt to feel);
And drown'd, without the furious ocean's aid,
In suffocating sorrows, shares his tomb.
Now round the sumptuous bridal monument
The guilty billows innocently roar,

And the rough sailor, passing, drops a tear.
A tear?-can tears suffice? - but not for me.
How vain our efforts and our arts how vain!
The distant train of thought I took, to shun,
Has thrown on me my fate. These died together;
Happy in ruin! undivorced by death!
Or ne'er to meet or ne'er to part is peace.-
Narcissa, Pity bleeds at thought of thee;
Yet thou wast only near me, not myself.
Survive myself?-that cures all other woe.
Narcissa lives; Philander is forgot.
O the soft commerce! O the tender ties,
Close twisted with the fibres of the heart!
Which, broken, break them, and drain off the soul
Of human joy, and make it pain to live.-
And is it then to live? when such friends part,
'Tis the survivor dies. - My heart! no more.

[merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

FEW ages have been deeper in dispute about religion than this. The dispute about religion, and the practice of it, seldom go together. The shorter therefore the dispute, the better. I think it may be reduced to this single question-Is man immortal, or Is he not? If he is not, all our disputes are mere amusements, or trials of skill. In this case, truth, reason, religion, which give our discourses such pomp and solemnity, are (as will be shewn) mere empty sounds without any meaning in them. But if man is immortal, it will behove him to be very serious about eternal consequences; or, in other words, to be truly religious. And this great fundamental truth, unestablished, or unawakened in the minds of men, is, I conceive, the real source and support of all our infidelity; how remote soever the particular objections advanced may seem to be from it.

Sensible appearances affect most men much more than abstract reasonings; and we daily see bodies drop around us, but the soul is invisible. The power which inclination has over the judgment, is greater than can be well conceived by those who have not had an experience of it; and of what numbers is it the sad interest, that souls should not survive! The Heathen world confessed, that they rather hoped than firmly believed immortality! and how many Heathens have we still amongst us? The sacred page assures us, that life and immortality are brought to light by the gospel: but by how many is the gospel rejected, or overlooked! From these considera

tions, and from my being, accidentally, privy to the sentiments of some particular persons, I have been long persuaded, that most, if not all, our Infidels (whatever name they take, and whatever scheme, for argument's sake, and to keep themselves in countenance, they patronise) are supported in their deplorable error by some doubt of their immortality, at the bottom. And I am satisfied, that men once thoroughly convinced of their immortality, are not far from being Christians. For it is hard to conceive, that a man fully conscious eternal pain or happiness will certainly be his lot, should not earnestly, and impartially, inquire after the surest means of escaping the one and securing the other. And of such an earnest and impartial inquiry, I well know the consequence.

Here, therefore, in proof of this most fundamental truth, some plain arguments are offered: arguments derived from principles which infidels admit in common with believers; arguments which appear to me altogether irresistible; and, such as, I am satisfied, will have great weight with all who give themselves the trouble of looking seriously into their own bosoms, and of observing, with any tolerable degree of attention, what daily passes round about them in the world.--If some arguments shall here occur which others have declined, they are submitted, with all deference, to better judgments in this, of all points the most important. For as to the being of a GOD, that is no longer disputed; but it is undisputed for this reason only, viz. because, where the least pretence to reason is admitted, it must for ever, be indisputable. And, of consequence, no man can be betrayed into a dispute of that nature by vanity, which has a principal share in animating our modern combatants against other articles of our belief.

F2

2

THE COMPLAINT.

NIGHT VI.

THE INFIDEL RECLAIMED.

IN TWO PARTS.

Containing the Nature, Proof, and Importance
of Immortality.

PART I.

Where, among other things, Glory and Riches are particularly considered.

Inscribed to the Rt. Hon. Henry Pelham.

SHE* (for I know not yet her name in heav'n)
Not early, like Narcissa, left the scene,
Nor sudden, like Philander. What avail?
This seeming mitigation but inflames:
This fancied med'cine heightens the disease.
The longer known, the closer still she grew,
And gradual parting is a gradual death.
'Tis the grim tyrant's engine which extorts,
By tardy pressure's still-increasing weight,
From hardest hearts confession of distress.
O the long dark approach, through years of pain,
Death's gall'ry! (might I dare to call it so)
With dismal doubt and sable terror hung,
Sick Hope's pale lamp its only glimm'ring ray:
There, Fate my melancholy walk ordain'd,

* Referring to Night the Fifth.

« AnkstesnisTęsti »