life's tax,

Heaven, earth, ourselves ; 'tis duty, glory, peace. 405
Afliction is the good man's shining scene ;
Prosperity conceals his brightest ray;
As night to stars, woe lustre gives to man.
Heroes in battle, pilots in the storm,
And virtue in calamities, admire.

410
The crown of manhood is a winter-joy ;
An evergreen, that stands the Northern blast,
And blossoms in the rigour of our fate.

'Tis a prime part of happiness, to know How much unhappiness must prove our lot; 415 A part which few possess ! I 'll

pay Without one rebel murmur, from this hour, Nor think it misery to be a man ; Who thinks it is, shall never be a God. Some ills we wish for, when we wish to live. 420

What spoke proud pasion ?>"* With my being loft?" Presumptuous ! blasphemous ! absurd ! and false ! The triumph of my soul is—That I am ; And therefore that I may be what? Lorenzo ! Look inward, and look deep; and deeper ftill ; 425 Unfathomably deep our treasure runs In golden veins, through all eternity! Ages, and ages, and succeeding still New ages, where the phantom of an hour, Which courts, each night, dull Number, for repair, 430 Shall wake, and wonder, and exult, and praise, And fly through infinite, and all unlock; And (if deservd) by heaven's redundant love,

Made * Referring to the First Night.

Made half-adorable itself, adore ;
And find, in adoration, endless joy !

435
Where thou, not master of a moment bere,
Frail as the flower, and feeting as the gale,
May'st boast a whale eternity, enrich'd
With all a kind Omnipotence can pour.
Since Adam fell, no mortal, uninspir'd,

440 Has ever yet conceiv'd, or ever fhall, How kind is God, how great (if good) is Man. No man too largely from heaven's love can hope, If what is hop d he labours to secure..

Ills ?--there are none : All-gracious ! none from thee; From man full many! numerous is the race Of blackest ills, and those immortal too, Begot by madness on fair liberty; Heaven's daughter, hell-debauch'd! ber hand alone Unlocks destruction to the fons of men,

450 Firft barr’d by thine: high-wall?d with adamant, Guarded with terrors reaching to this world, And cover'd with the thunders of thy law; Whose threats are mercies, whose injunctions, guides, Aflifting, not restraining, reafon's choice; 455 Whose sanctions, unavoidable refults From nature's course, indulgently reveald; If unreveal’d, more dangerous, nor less sure. Thus, an indulgent father warns his sons, “ Do this; Ay that”-nor always tells the cause ; 460 Pleas'd to reward, as duty to his will, A conduct needful to their own repose. Great God of wonders ! (if, thy love survey'd,

'Aught

Aught else the name of wonderful retains)
What rocks are these, on which to build our trust! 465
Thy ways admit no blemish ; none I find;
Or this alones That none is to be found."
Not one, to soften cenfure's hardy crime;
Not one, to palliate peevith grief's Complaint,
Who like a dæmon, murmuring-from the dust,

470
Dares into judgment call her Judge.Supreme!
For all I bless thee; moft, for the severe;
* Her death-my own at hand+the fiery gulph,
That Aaming bound of wrath omnipotent !
It thunders ;--but it thunders to preserve; 475
It strengthens'what it strikes ; its wholfome dread
Averts the dreaded pain; its hideous groans
Join heaven's sweet hallelujahs in thy praise,
Great Source of good alone! How kind in all!
-In vengeance kind ! pain, death, gehenna, Save. 488

Thus, in thy world material, Mighty Mind! Not that alone which solaces, and shines, The rough and gloomy, challenges our praise. The winter is as needful as the spring ; The thunder, as the fun; a stagnate mafs 485 Of vapours breeds a peftilential air : Nor more propitious the Favonian breeze To nature's health, than purifying storms-; The dread Volcano ministers to good. Its sinother'd fames might undermine the world.

490 Loud Ætnas fulminate in love to man; Comets good omens are, when duly scann'd; VOL. III.

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And, * Lucia.

And, in their use, eclipses learn to shine.

Man is responsible for ills receiv’d; Those we call wretched are a chofen band, 495 Compell’d to refuge in the right, for peace. Amid my list of blessings infinite, Stand this the foremost, “ That my heart has bled." "Tis heaven's last effort of good-will to man; When pain can't bless, heaven quits us in despair. 500 Who fails to grieve, when just occasion calls, Or grieves. too much, deserves not to be bleft; Inhuman, or effeminate, his heart; Reason absolves the grief, which reason ends. May heaven ne'er trust my friend with happiness, 505 Till it has taught him how to bear it well, By previous pain; and inade it safe to smile ! Such smiles are mine, and such may they remain ; Nor hazard their extinction, from excess. My change of heart a change of style demands;

510 The Consolation cancels the Complaint, And makes a convert of my guilty song.

And when o'er-labour'd, and inclin'd to breathe, A panting traveller fome rifing ground, Some small afcent, has gain'd, he turns him round, 515 And measures with his eye the various vales, The fields, woods, meads, and rivers, he has past; And, fatiate of his journey, thinks of home, Endear'd by distance, nor affects more toil; Thus I, though small, indeed, is that ascent 520 The Muse has gain’d, review the paths she trod; Various, extensive, beaten but by view;

And,

And, conscious of her prudence in repose,
Pause; and with pleasure meditate an end,
Though still remote; fo fruitful is my theme. $25
Through many a field of moral, and divine,
The Muse has ftray'd; and much of sorrow feen
In human ways; and much of falfe and vain;
Which none, who travel this bad road, can miss.
O'er friends deceas'd full heartily Hae wept;

530 1 Of love divine the wonders fhe display'd;

Prov'd man immortal; thew'd the source of joy;
The grand tribunal rais?d; asign’d the bounds
Of human grief: in few, to close the whole,
The moral. Muse has shadow'd out a sketch, 535
Though not in form, nor with a Raphael-stroke,
Of most our weakness needs believe, or do,
In this our land of travel and of hope,
For peace on earth, or prospect of the skies.

What then remains ? Much! much! a mighty debt
To be discharg'd : these thoughts, O Night! are thine;
From thee they came, like lovers' secret fighs,
While others slept. So Cynthia (poets feign)
In shadows veild, soft-sliding froin her sphere,
Her shepherd cheard; of her enamour'd less, 545
Than I of thee. And art thou still unsung,
Beneath whose brow, and by whose aid, I fing?
Immortal silence ! where shall I begin?
Where.end ? Or how steal music from the spheres,
To footh their goddess ?.

550

O majestic Night!
Nature's great ancestor! day's elder-born!.

And

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