Rank poison, first fermenting to mere froth,
And then subsiding into final gall?
To beings of sublime, immortal make,
How shocking is all joy whose end is sure!
Such joy more shocking still, the more it charms!
And dost thou choose what ends ere well begun, 2066
And infamous as short? and dost thou choose
(Thou, to whose palate glory is so sweet)
To wade into perdition through contempt,
Not of poor bigots only, but thy own?
For I have peep'd into thy cover'd heart,
And seen it blush beneath a boastful brow?
For by strong Guilt's most violent assault,
Conscience is but disabled, not destroy'd.
O thou most awful being! and most vain!
Thy will how frail! how glorious is thy power?
Though dread Eternity has sown her seeds
Of bliss and woe in thy despotic breast;
Though heaven and hell depend upon thy choice,
A butterfly comes cross, and both are fled.
Is this the picture of a rational?
This horrid image, shall it be more just?
Lorenzo! no; it cannot,-shall not be,
If there is force in reason; or in sounds
Chanted beneath the glimpses of the moon,
A magic, at this planetary hour,
When Slumber locks the general lip, and dreams,
Through senseless mazes, hunts souls uninspired.
Attend the sacred mysteries begin
My solemn night-born adjuration hear:
Hear, and I'll raise thy spirit from the dust,
While the stars gaze on this enchantment new;
Enchantment not infernal, but divine!
By Darkness, Guilt's inevitable doom;
'By Silence, Death's peculiar attribute ;
By Darkness and by Silence, sisters dread!
That draw the curtain round Night's ebon throne,
And raise ideas solemn as the scene!
By Night, and all of awful Night presents
To thought or sense (of awful much, to both
The goddess brings!) By these her trembling fires,
Like Vesta's, ever-burning, and, like hers,
Sacred to thoughts immaculate and pure!
By these bright orators that prove and praise,
And press thee to revere the Deity;
Perhaps, too, aid thee, when revered, a while
To reach his throne, as stages of the soul,
Through which, at different periods, she shall pass,
Refining gradual, for her final height,
And purging off some dross at every sphere!
By this dark pall thrown o'er the silent world!
By the world's kings and kingdoms most renown'd,
From short Ambition's zenith set for ever,
Sad presage to vain boasters, now in bloom!
By the long list of swift mortality,
From Adam downward to this evening knell,
Which midnight waves in Fancy's startled eye,
And shocks her with a hundred centuries,
Round Death's black banner throng'd in human thought
By thousands, now, resigning their last breath, 2120
And calling thee-wert thou so wise to hear!
By tombs o'er tombs arising, human earth
Ejected, to make room for-human earth,
The monarch's terror! and the sexton's trade!
By pompous obsequies that shun the day,
The torch funereal, and the nodding plume,
Which makes poor man's humiliation proud,
Boast of our ruin! triumph of our dust!
By the damp vault that weeps o'er royal bones,
And the pale lamp that shows the ghastly dead, 2130
More ghastly through the thick incumbent gloom!
By visits (if there are) from darker scenes,
The gliding spectre! and the groaning grove !
By groans, and graves, and miseries that groan
For the grave's shelter! By desponding men,
Senseless to pains of death from pangs of guilt!
By Guilt's last audit! By yon moon in blood,
The rocking firmament, the falling stars,
And thunder's last discharge, great Nature's knell!
By second Chaos, and eternal Night,--
Be wise- nor let Philander blame my charm;
But own not ill discharged my doubie debt,
Love to the living, duty to the dead.
For know I'm but executor: he left
This moral legacy; I make it o'er
By his command: Philander hear in me,
And Heaven in both.-If deaf to these, oh! hear
Florello's tender voice; his weal depends
On thy resolve; it trembles at thy choice;
For his sake-love thyself: example strikes
Al! human hearts; a bad example more;
More still a father's; that insures his ruin.
As parent of his being, wouldst thou prove
The' unnatural parent of his miseries,
And make him curse the being which thou gavest?
Is this the blessing of so fond a father?
If careless of Lorenzo, spare, oh! spare
Florello's father, and Philander's friend!
Florello's father ruin'd, rains him;
And from Philander's friend the world expects 2160
A conduct no dishonour to the dead.
Let passion do what nobler motive should;
Let love and emulation rise in aid
To reason, and persuade thee to be-bless'd.
This seems not a request to be denied;
Yet (such the infatuation of mankind!)
Tis the most hopeless man can make to man.
Shall I then rise in argument and warmth?
And urge Philander's posthumous advice,
From topics yet unbroach'd ?
But, oh! I faint my spirits fail! nor strange!
So long on wing, and in no middle clime!
To which my great Creator's glory call'd;
And calls-but, now, in vain. Sleep's dewy wand
Has stroked my drooping lids, and promises
My long arrear of rest: the downy god
(Wont to return with our returning peace)
Will pay, ere long, and bless me with repose.
Haste, haste, sweet stranger! from the peasant's cot,
The shipboy's hammock, or the soldier's straw, 2180
Whence Sorrow never chased thee; with thee bring
Not hideous visions, as of late, but draughts
Delicious of well tasted cordial rest,
Man's rich restorative; his balmy bath,
That supples, lubricates, and keeps in play
The various movements of this nice machine,
Which asks such frequent periods of repair.
When tired with vain rotations of the day,
Sleep winds us up for the succeeding dawn;
Fresh we spin on, till sickness clogs our wheels, 2190
Or death quite breaks the spring, and motion euds :
When will it end with me?
-Thou only know'st,
Thou, whose broad eye the future and the past
Joins to the present, making one of three
To mortal thought! Thou know'st, and Thou alone,
All knowing!-all unknown !—and yet well known!
Near, though remote ! and, though unfathom'd, felt!
And, though invisible, for ever seen!
And seen in all the great and the minute.
Each globe above, with its gigantic race,
Each flower, each leaf, with its small people swarm'd,
(Those puny vouchers of Omnipotence !)
To the first thought that asks From whence?' declare
Their common source: thou fountain, running o'er
In rivers of communicated joy!
Who gavest us speech for far, far humbler themes!
Say by what name shall I presume to call
Him I see burning in these countless suns,
As Moses in the bush? illustrious Mind !
The whole creation less, far less, to Thee,
Than that to the creation's ample round,
How shall I name Thee ?-How my labouring soul
Heaves underneath the thought, too big for birth!
'Great System of perfections! mighty Cause
Of causes mighty! Cause uncaused! sole root 2215
Of Nature, that luxuriant growth of God'
First Father of effects! that progeny
Of endless series; where the golden chain's
Last link admits a period, who can tell?
Father of all that is or heard or hears!
Father of all that is or seen or sees!
Father of all that is or shall arise!
Father of this immeasurable mass
Of matter multiform, or dense or rare,
Opaque or lucid, rapid or at rest,
Minute or passing bound! in each extreme
Of like amaze and mystery to man.
Father of these bright millions of the night!
Of which the least, full Godhead had proclaim'd,
And thrown the gazer on his knee-Or, say,
Is appellation higher still thy choice?
Father of matter's temporary lords!
Father of spirits! nobler offspring! sparks
Of high paternal glory, rich endow'd
With various measures, and with various modes 2235
Of instinct, reason, intuition; beams
More pale or bright from day divine, to break
The dark of matter organized (the ware
Of all created spirit) beams that rise
Each over other in superior light,
Till the last ripens into lustre strong,
Of next approach to Godhead. Father fond
(Far fonder than ere bore that name on earth)
Of intellectual beings! beings bless'd
With powers to please thee, not of passivo ply 2245
To laws they know not; beings lodged in seats
Of well adapted joys, in different domes
Of this imperial paiace for thy sons;
Of this proud, populous, well policied,
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