The elements of all that thou didst know; The changing seasons, winter's leafless reign, The budding of the heaven-breathing trees, The eternal orbs that beautify the night, The sun-rise, and the setting of the moon, Earthquakes and wars, and poisons and disease, And all their causes, to an abstract point, Converging, thou didst bend, and called it-God! The self-sufficing, the omnipotent,
The merciful, and the avenging God! Who, prototype of human misrule, sits
High in heaven's realm, upon a golden throne,
Even like an earthly king; and whose dread work, Hell, gapes for ever for the unhappy slaves
Of fate, whom he created, in his sport,
To triumph in their torments when they fell!
Earth heard the name; earth trembled, as the smoke Of his revenge ascended up to heaven,
Blotting the constellations; and the cries
Of millions, butchered in sweet confidence
And unsuspecting peace, even when the bonds
Of safety were confirmed by wordy oaths
Sworn in his dreadful name, rung through the land: Whilst innocent babes writhed on thy stubborn spear, And thou didst laugh to hear the mother's shriek Of maniac gladness, as the sacred steel
Felt cold in her torn entrails!
Religion! thou wert then in manhood's prime : But age crept on: one God would not suffice For senile puerility; thou framedst
A tale to suit thy dotage, and to glut Thy misery-thirsting soul, that the mad fiend Thy wickedness had pictured, might afford A plea for sating the unnatural thirst
For murder, rapine, violence, and crime,
That still consumed thy being, even when
Thou heardest the step of fate;-that flames might light
Thy funeral scene, and the shrill horrent shrieks
Of parents dying on the pile that burned
To light their children to thy paths, the roar Of the encircling flames, the exulting cries Of thine apostles, loud commingling there, Might sate thine hungry ear Even on the bed of death!
But now contempt is mocking thy grey hairs; Thou art descending to the darksome grave, Unhonoured and unpitied, but by those Whose pride is passing by like thine, and sheds, Like thine, a glare that fades before the sun Of truth, and shines but in the dreadful night That long has lowered above the ruined world.
Throughout these infinite orbs of mingling light, Of which yon earth is one, is wide diffused A spirit of activity and life,
That knows no term, cessation, or decay;
That fades not when the lamp of earthly life, Extinguished in the dampness of the grave, Awhile there slumbers, more than when the babe In the dim newness of its being feels The impulses of sublunary things,
And all is wonder to unpractised sense : But active, steadfast, and eternal, still
Guides the fierce whirlwind, in the tempest roars, Cheers in the day, breathes in the balmy groves, Strengthens in health, and poisons in disease; And in the storm of change, that ceaselessly Rolls round the eternal universe, and shakes Its undecaying battlement, presides, Apportioning with irresistible law
The place each spring of its machine shall fill ; So that when waves on waves tumultuous heap Confusion to the clouds, and fiercely driven Heaven's lightnings scorch the uprooted ocean-fords, Whilst, to the eye of shipwrecked mariner, Lone sitting on the bare and shuddering rock, All seems inlinked contingency and chance: No atom of this turbulence fulfils
A vague and unnecessitated task, Or acts but as it must and ought to act. Even the minutest molecule of light, That in an April sunbeam's fleeting glow Fulfils its destined, though invisible work, The universal Spirit guides; nor less, When merciless ambition, or mad zeal, Has led two hosts of dupes to battle-field,
That, blind, they there may dig each other's graves, And call the sad work-glory, does it rule All passions not a thought, a will, an act, No working of the tyrant's moody mind, Nor one misgiving of the slaves who boast Their servitude, to hide the shame they feel, Nor the events enchaining every will, That from the depths of unrecorded time Have drawn all influencing virtue, pass Unrecognised, or unforeseen by thee, Soul of the Universe! eternal spring Of life and death, of happiness and woe, Of all that chequers the phantasmal scene
That floats before our eyes in wavering light, Which gleams but on the darkness of our prison, Whose chains and massy walls
Spirit of Nature! all-sufficing Power, Necessity! thou mother of the world! Unlike the God of human error, thou
Requirest no prayers or praises; the caprice Of man's weak will belongs no more to thee Than do the changeful passions of his breast To thy unvarying harmony: the slave, Whose horrible lusts spread misery o'er the world, And the good man, who lifts, with virtuous pride, His being, in the sight of happiness,
That springs from his own works; the poison-tree, Beneath whose shade all life is withered up, And the fair oak, whose leafy dome affords A temple where the vows of happy love Are registered, are equal in thy sight: No love, no hate thou cherishest; revenge
And favouritism, and worst desire of fame
Thou knowest not: all that the wide world contains Are but thy passive instruments, and thou Regardst them all with an impartial eye, Whose joy or pain thy nature cannot feel, Because thou hast not human sense, Because thou art not human mind.
Yes! when the sweeping storm of time Has sung its death-dirge o'er the ruined fanes And broken altars of the almighty fiend, Whose name usurps thy honours, and the blood Through centuries clotted there, has floated down The tainted flood of ages, shalt thou live Unchangeable ! A shrine is raised to thee Which, nor the tempest-breath of time, Nor the interminable flood,
Over earth's slight pageant rolling,
Availeth to destroy,
The sensitive extension of the world. That wondrous and eternal fane,
Where pain and pleasure, good and evil join, To do the will of strong necessity,
And life, in multitudinous shapes,
Still pressing forward where no term can be, Like hungry and unresisting flame
Curls round the eternal columns of its strength.
I was an infant when my mother went
To see an atheist burned. She took me there : The dark-robed priests were met around the pile; The multitude was gazing silently;
And as the culprit passed with dauntless mien, Tempered disdain in his unaltering eye, Mixed with a quiet smile, shone calmly forth: The thirsty fire crept round his manly limbs ; His resolute eyes were scorched to blindness soon; His death-pang rent my heart! the insensate mob Uttered a cry of triumph, and I wept.
Weep not, child! cried my mother, for that man Has said, There is no God.
Nature confirms the faith his death-groan sealed: Let heaven and earth, let man's revolving race, His ceaseless generations tell their tale;
Let every part depending on the chain That links it to the whole, point to the hand That grasps its term! let every seed that falls In silent eloquence unfold its store Of argument: infinity within, Infinity without, belie creation;
The exterminable spirit it contains Is nature's only God; but human pride Is skilful to invent most serious names To hide its ignorance.
Has fenced about all crime with holiness,
Himself the creature of his worshippers,
Whose names, and attributes, and passions change, Seeva, Buddh, Foh, Jehovah, God, or Lord, Even with the human dupes who build his shrines, Still serving o'er the war-polluted world For desolation's watch-word; whether hosts Stain his death-blushing chariot-wheels, as on Triumphantly they roll, whilst Brahmins raise A sacred hymn to mingle with the groans; Or countless partners of his powers divide His tyranny to weakness; or the smoke
Of burning towns, the cries of female helplessness, Unarmed old age, and youth, and infancy, Horribly massacred, ascend to heaven
In honour of his name; or, last and worst, Earth groans beneath religion's iron age, And priests dare babble of a God of peace, Even whilst their hands are red with guiltless blood, Murdering the while, uprooting every germ Of truth, exterminating, spoiling all, Making the earth a slaughter-house!
O Spirit! through the sense
By which thy inner nature was apprised Of outward shows, vague dreams have rolled, And varied reminiscences have waked Tablets that never fade;
All things have been imprinted there, The stars, the sea, the earth, the sky, Even the unshapeliest lineaments Of wild and fleeting visions
Have left a record there
To testify of earth.
These are my empire, for to me is given The wonders of the human world to keep, And fancy's thin creations to endow
With manner, being, and reality;
Therefore a wondrous phantom, from the dreams Of human errors dense and purblind faith, will evoke, to meet thy questioning.
A strange and woe-worn wight
Arose beside the battlement,
And stood unmoving there. His inessential figure cast no shade Upon the golden floor;
His port and mien bore mark of many years, And chronicles of untold ancientness Were legible within his beamless eye:
Yet his cheek bore the mark of youth; Freshness and vigour knit his manly frame; The wisdom of old age was mingled there With youth's primæval dauntlessness; And inexpressible woe,
Chastened by fearless resignation, gave An awrul grace to his all-speaking brow.*
Is there a God?-ay, an almighty God, And vengeful as almighty! Once his voice
Was heard on earth: earth shuddered at the sound The fiery-visaged firmament expressed
Abhorrence, and the grave of nature yawned 'To swallow all the dauntless and the good
That dared to hurl defiance at his throne,
Girt as it was with power. None but slaves
Survived, cold-blooded slaves, who did the work
Of tyrannous omnipotence; whose souls No honest indignation ever urged
To elevated daring, to one deed
Which gross and sensual self did not pollute.
These slaves built temples for the omnipotent fiend, Gorgeous and vast: the costly altars smoked With human blood, and hideous pans rung
Through all the long-drawn aisles. A murderer heard His voice in Egypt, one whose gifts and arts Had raised him to his eminence in power,
Accomplice of omnipotence in crime, And confidant of the all-knowing one. These were Jehovah's words.
From an eternity of idleness
I, God, awoke; in seven days' toil made earth From nothing; rested, and created man : I placed him in a paradise, and there Planted the tree of evil, so that he
Might eat and perish, and my soul procure Wherewith to sate its malice, and to turn,
* The tradition of the "Wandering Jew" is, that when our Lord was wearied with the burthen of his ponderous cross, and wanted to rest before the door of Ahasuerus, the unfeeling wretch drove him away with brutality. The Saviour of mankind staggered, sinking under the heavy load, but uttered no complaint. An angel of death appeared before Ahasuerus, and exclaimed indignantly, "Barbarian! thou hast denied rest to the Son of Man: be it denied thee also, until he comes to judge the world."
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