And there were groans that ended not, and sighs That always sighed, and tears that ever wept And ever fell, but not in Mercy's sight; And still I heard these wretched beings curse Almighty God, and curse the Lamb, and curse The Earth, the Resurrection morn, and seek, And ever vainly seek for utter death : And from above the thunders answered still, " Ye knew your duty, but ye did it not." And every where throughout that horrid den, I saw a form of Excellence, a form
Of beauty without spot, that nought could see And not admire-admire, and not adore. And from its own essential beams it gave Light to itself, that made the gloom more dark; And every eye in that infernal pit
Beheld it still; and from its face, how fair! O how exceeding fair! for ever sought, But ever vainly sought, to turn away. That image, as I guess, was Virtue, for
Nought else hath God given countenance so fair.
But why in such a place it should abide ? What place it is? What beings there lament? Whence came they? and for what their endless groan?
Why curse they God? why seek they utter death? And chief, what means the Resurrection morn? My youth expects thy reverend age to tell.
Thou rightly deem'st, fair youth, began the bard;
The form thou saw'st was Virtue, ever fair. Virtue, like God, whose excellent majesty, Whose glory virtue is, is omnipresent; No being, once created rational, Accountable, endowed with moral sense, With sapience of right and wrong endowed, And charged, however fallen, debased, destroyed; However lost, forlorn, and miserable;
In guilt's dark shrouding wrapt however thick;
However drunk, delirious, and mad,
With sin's full cup; and with whatever damned Unnatural diligence it work and toil,
Can banish virtue from its sight, or once Forget that she is fair. Hides it in night, In central night; takes it the lightning's wing, And flies for ever on, beyond the bounds Of all; drinks it the maddest cup of sin; Dives it beneath the ocean of despair;
It dives, it drinks, it flies, it hides in vain. For still the eternal beauty, image fair, Once stampt upon the soul, before the eye All lovely stands, nor will depart; so God Ordains and lovely to the worst she seems, And ever seems; and as they look, and still Must ever look upon her loveliness,
Remembrance dire of what they were, of what They might have been, and bitter sense of what They are, polluted, ruined, hopeless, lost,
With most repenting torment rend their hearts.
So God ordains—their punishment severe,
Eternally inflicted by themselves.
'Tis this this Virtue hovering evermore Before the vision of the damned, and in Upon their monstrous moral nakedness Casting unwelcome light, that makes their wo, That makes the essence of the endless flame: Where this is, there is Hell-darker than aught That he, the bard three-visioned, darkest saw.
The place thou saw'st was hell; the groans thou heard'st
The wailings of the damned of those who would Not be redeemed and at the judgment day, Long past, for unrepented sins were damned. The seven loud thunders which thou heard'st,
The eternal wrath of the Almighty God.
But whence, or why they came to dwell in wo,
Why they curse God, what means the glorious
Of Resurrection, these a longer tale
Demand, and lead the mournful lyre far back
Thro' memory of Sin, and mortal man. Yet haply not rewardless we shall trace The dark disastrous years of finished Time : Sorrows remembered sweeten present joy. Nor yet shall all be sad; for God gave peace, Much peace, on earth, to all who feared his name.
But first it needs to say, that other style, And other language than thy ear is wont, Thou must expect to hear the dialect Of man; for each in heaven a relish holds
Of former speech, that points to whence he came. But whether I of person speak, or place;
Event or action; moral or divine;
Or things unknown compare to things unknown
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