When shall we see the Great Unknown, In thee what endless wonders meet! Angels are lost in sweet surprise And humble awe runs through the skies, When mercy joins with majesty, Thy works the strongest seraph sings And labors hard on all his strings Created powers, how weak they be! And thou the eternal All. ASKING LEAVE TO SING. YET, mighty God indulge my tongue, Nor let thy thunders roar, Whilst the young notes and venturous song To worlds of glory soar. If thou my daring flight forbid, Her slender reed, inspired by thee, She mocks the trumpet's loud alarms, But when she tastes her Saviour's love, Scarce the divinest harp above DIVINE JUDGMENTS. NOT from the dust my sorrows spring, Their mingled curses on my head, How vain their curses, if the eternal King Are but his slaves and must obey ; They wait their orders from above, And execute his word, the vengeance, or the love. 'Tis by a warrant from his hand, The gentler gales are bound to sleep: The north wind blusters and assumes command Over the desert and the deep; Old Boreas with his freezing powers, Turns the earth iron, makes the ocean glass, Arrests the dancing rivulets as they pass, And chains them moveless to their shores; The grazing ox lows to the gelid skies, Walks o'er the marble meads with withering eyes, Walks o'er the solid lakes, snuffs up the wind, and dies. Fly to the polar world my song, And mourn the pilgrims there (a wretched throng!) Seized and bound in rigid chains, A troop of statues on the Russian plains, And magazines of frost, and magazines of flame. Dress thee in steel to meet his wrath; His sharp artillery from the north Shall pierce thee to the soul, and shake thy mortal frame. Sublime on winter's rugged wings He rides in arms along the sky, And flocks, and herds, and nations die; Grow pale; and, quivering at his dreadful cold, The mischiefs that infest the earth, When the hot dog-star fires the realms on high, Drought, and disease, and cruel dearth, Are but the flashes of a wrathful eye From the incens'd divinity. In vain our parching palates thirst, For vital food we cry, And pant for vital breath; The verdant fields are burnt to dust, The sun has drunk the channels dry, Ye And all the air is death. scourges of our Maker's rod, 'Tis at his dread command, at his imperial nod, You deal your various plagues abroad. Hail, whirlwinds, hurricanes, and floods, And bear down with a mighty sweep And bury millions in the waves; Earthquakes, that in midnight sleep Turn cities into heaps, and make our beds our graves; While you dispense your mortal harms, 'Tis the Creator's voice that sounds your loud alarms, When guilt, with louder cries, provokes a God to arms. O for a message from above Some pledge of my Creator's love Let waves and thunders mix and roar, I shall be rich till thou art poor; For all I fear, and all I wish, heaven, earth and hell are thine. |