Even in the very childhood of his being,
With mortal shadows dimmed and wrapped around,
Could comprehend at once the mighty scheme,
Where rolled the ocean of eternal love;
Where wisdom infinite its master-stroke
Displayed; and where omnipotence, oppressed,
Did travail in the greatness of its strength;
And everlasting justice lifted up
The sword to smite the guiltless Son of God;
And mercy smiling bade the sinner go!
Redemption is the science and the song
Of all eternity. Archangels day
And night into its glories look. The saints,
The elders round the Throne, old in the years
Of heaven, examine it perpetually;
And, every hour, get clearer, ampler views
Of right and wrong; see virtue's beauty more;
See vice more utterly depraved and vile;
And this, with a more perfect hatred, hate;
That daily love with a more perfect love.
But whether I for man's perdition blame Office administered amiss, pursuit Of pleasure false, perverted reason blind, Or indolence that ne'er inquired; I blame Effect and consequence, the branch, the leaf. Who finds the fount and bitter root, the first And guiltiest cause whence sprung this endless wo, Must deep descend into the human heart, And find it there. Dread passion! making men On earth, and even in hell, if Mercy yet Would stoop so low, unwilling to be saved, If saved by grace of God. Hear, then, in brief, What peopled hell, what holds its prisoners there.
Pride, self-adoring pride, was primal cause Of all sin passed, all pain, all wo to come. Unconquerable pride! first, eldest sin,
Great fountain-head of evil! highest source,
Whence flowed rebellion 'gainst the Omnipotent,
Whence hate of man to man, and all else ill.
Pride at the bottom of the human heart
Lay, and gave root and nourishment to all
That grew above. Great ancestor of vice!
Hate, unbelief, and blasphemy of God;
Envy and slander, malice and revenge;
And murder, and deceit, and every birth
Of damned sort, was progeny of pride.
It was the ever-moving, acting force,
The constant aim, and the most thirsty wish
Of every sinner unrenewed, to be
A god; in purple or in rags, to have
Himself adored. Whatever shape or form
His actions took, whatever phrase he threw
About his thoughts, or mantle o'er his life,
To be the highest, was the inward cause
Of all; the purpose of the heart to be
Set up, admired, obeyed. But who would bow
The knee to one who served and was dependent?
Hence man's perpetual struggle, night and day,
To prove he was his own proprietor,
And independent of his God, that what
He had might be esteemed his own, and praised
As such. He laboured still and tried to stand
Alone, unpropped, to be obliged to none;
And in the madness of his pride, he bade
His God farewell, and turned away to be
A god himself: resolving to rely,
Whatever came, upon his own right hand.
O desperate frenzy! madness of the will!
And drunkenness of the heart! that naught could quench But floods of wo, poured from the sea of wrath,
The back on life original, and live!
The creature to set up a rival throne
In the Creator's realm! to deify
A worm! and in the sight of God be proud!
To lift an arm of flesh against the shafts
Of the Omnipotent, and, midst his wrath,
To seek for happiness!—insanity
Most mad! guilt most complete!
That roll at various distance round the throne
Of God, innumerous, and fill the calm
Of heaven with sweetest harmony, when saints
And angels sleep? As one of these, from love
Centripetal, withdrawing, and from light,
And heat, and nourishment cut off, should rush
Abandoned o'er the line that runs between
Create and increate, from ruin driven
To ruin still, through the abortive waste;
So pride from God drew off the bad; and so
Forsaken of him, he lets them ever try
Their single arm against the second death;
Amidst vindictive thunders lets them try
The stoutness of their hearts, and lets them try
To quench their thirst amidst the unfading fire;
And to reap joy where he has sown despair;
To walk alone, unguided, unbemoaned,
Where Evil dwells, and Death, and moral Night;
In utter emptiness to find enough;
In utter dark find light; and find repose,
Where God with tempest plagues for evermore.
For so they wished it, so did pride desire.
Such was the cause that turned so many off
Rebelliously from God, and led them on
From vain to vainer still, in endless chase.
And such the cause that made so many cheeks
Pale, and so many knees to shake, when men
Rose from the grave; as thou shalt hear anon.
BEHOLDST thou yonder, on the crystal sea,
Beneath the throne of God, an image fair,
And in its hand a mirror large and bright?
'Tis truth, immutable, eternal truth,
In figure emblematical expressed.
Before it Virtue stands, and smiling sees,
Well pleased, in her reflected soul, no spot.
The sons of heaven, archangel, seraph, saint,
There daily read their own essential worth;
And, as they read, take place among the just;
Or high, or low, each as his value seems.
There each his certain interest learns, his true
Capacity; and, going thence, pursues,
Unerringly, through all the tracts of thought,
As God ordains, best ends by wisest means..
The Bible held this mirror's place on earth. But, few would read, or, reading, saw themselves. The chase was after shadows, phantoms strange, That in the twilight walked of Time, and mocked The eager hunt, escaping evermore.
Yet with so many promises and looks
Of gentle sort, that he whose arms returned Empty a thousand times, still stretched them out, And, grasping, brought them back again unfilled.
In rapid outline thou hast heard of man,
His death, his offered life, that life by most
Despised, the Star of God, the Bible, scorned,
That else to happiness and heaven had led,
And saved my lyre from narrative of wo.
Hear now more largely of the ways of Time,
The fond pursuits and vanities of men.
"Love God, love truth, love virtue, and be happy ;" These were the words first uttered in the ear Of every being rational made, and made For thought, or word, or deed accountable. Most men the first forgot, the second none. Whatever path they took, by hill or vale, By night or day, the universal wish, The aim, and sole intent, was happiness. But, erring from the heaven-appointed path,
Strange tracks indeed they took through barren wastes, And up the sandy mountain climbing toiled,
Which pining lay beneath the curse of God,
And naught produced. Yet did the traveller look
And point his eye before him greedily,
As if he saw some verdant spot, where grew
The heavenly flower, where sprung the well of life,
Where undisturbed felicity reposed;
Though Wisdom's eye no vestige could discern,
That Happiness had ever passed that way.
Wisdom was right, for still the terms remained Unchanged, unchangeable, the terms on which True peace was given to man, unchanged as God, Who, in his own essential nature, binds
Eternally to virtue happiness,
Nor lets them part through all his universe.
Philosophy, as thou shalt hear, when she
Shall have her praise, her praise and censure too,
Did much, refining and exalting man ;
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