There from the Mercy-seat itself evokes
An answer, thrilling the seraphic host
With added glory of celestial song!—
For prayer is man's omnipotence below,
A soul's companionship with Christ and God,
Communion with Eternity begun!
PLEASANT is Morning, when her radiant eye
Opes on the world, enchanting all the sky;
And Ev'ning with her balmy glow of light,
The beauteous herald of romantic night :
And pleasant oft to some poetic mind
The sound of water, and the sweep of wind;
A friend renew'd in some heart-welcom'd place,
With years of fondness rising in his face;
The tear that answers to a tale of woe,
And happy feelings in their heav'nward flow.
But sweeter far proves his revengeful lot
Whom fame hath slighted, or the World forgot,
In printed bile to let his spirit vent,
And mangle volumes to his heart's content;
Corrupt what style, create what fault he please,
Laugh o'er the truth, and lie with graceful ease!
Thus envy lives, and disappointment heals
That gangren'd wound a tortur'd mem'ry feels;
The wither'd hopes delightful vengeance wreak,
And
pages thunder more than scorn could speak!
And thus with thee, whose life I now recall:
Malignant trash,-'twas thine to scorn it all!
Each reptile started from his snug review
To spit out poison,-as most reptiles do;
Oh! how they feasted on each faulty line,
And generously made their dulness thine!
From page to page they grinn'd a ghastly smile,
Yet seem'd to look so heav'nlike all the while :
Then talk'd of merit to the world unknown,—
Ah! who could doubt them, for they meant their own.
Religion too!-what right had he to scan
The scheme of glory which she wove for man;
Or paint around him, whereso'er he trod,
The glowing fulness of eternal God?
Indeed 'twas hinted,-hoped it was untrue,
His heart had worn an atheistic hue;
And still religion, though its hallow'd name
Had lent a freshness to his early fame,
Had not alike both heart and head inspir'd;
In short, the world was sick, and they were tired;
And then, to prove his verse had made it vile,
They mouth'd it in their own sweet monthly style!
Next, Paternoster hired a serpent too,
To sound his rattle in a Scotch review ;*
And yet, alas! that such a menial end
Should wait on all who noble taste defend,
Though much was thought, and more divinely said,
The poet triumph'd, and the public read;
And when abuse herself had ceas'd to pay,
The public hooted, and she slunk away!
Vide Notes to the Appendix.
POWER AND BEAUTY OF TRUTH,
ACKNOWLEDGED BY SATAN.
AND such is Truth !-in Heaven and Hell the same.
Yea! Hate herself in agony avows,
That Virtue is triumphant, and the best :
Her glories are my tortures; but they shine
Upon me, blasting with victorious light
The envy which I bear them, when I scan
The mazes of mortality.-How kind
In men, to aid the darkness that I bring
On fallen Nature! heedful of the vile,
And damning all, I'd fain destroy. Thus Vice
In splendour will appear, while Virtue droops,
Like a lone shadow pining in the sun.
And never shall the Good the Bad exceed,
While Sin can put enchantment in her smile,
While Passions are the tyrants of the soul!
FRAIL king of dust, man loves to look around,
And think," for me the elements abound
With life and motion; shade and sunshine wait
In mixt attendance on my human state;
Light, sea, and air, their glorious spell maintain,
That I alone, as Lord of Earth, may reign!"
And yet, what art thou?-but a fleeting breath,
A pulse of life that throbs away in death?-
Myriads of creatures round thee move and die
Minute beyond the ken of mortal eye;
Perfect as thine, their bright existence teems
With beauty, in a paradise of beams;
Or, in some crystal world of water play*
A floating populace of insects gay;
And He who bade exalted man to be
An image of his own eternity,
Alike to them a form and feature gives,
And not a mote but in His mem'ry lives!—
REFLECTIONS AT NIGHT.
'Tis night; the holy, deep, delicious night!
Oh! pardon me, mild Elements! whose wand
Of loveliness doth so becalm the world,
If Fancy hath awhile your scene forgot;
Again a worshipper, my spirit bows
ye, panting for a mightier voice
Than Ecstacy, though all divinely toned.
Thou blue eternity of space! adorn'd
With radiant solitudes, how many eyes
Of spirits, who have ceased to walk the globe,
Imaginings from thee have caught, and gazed,
Until the soul amid yon azure wild
Seem'd wand'ring, as on seraph-music borne !—
*The recent observations of Professor Ehringburgh have brought to light the existence of Monads which are not larger than the 24,000th part of an inch, and which are so thickly crowded in the fluid, as to leave intervals not greater than their own diameter. Hence he has made the computation, that each cubic line which is nearly the bulk of a single drop, contains 500,000,000 of these Monads, a number which equals that of all the human beings existing on the surface of the globe.-Roget's Bridgewater Treatise, Vol. 1. 1. p3.
Mysterious hour! when most self-knowledge
And minutes are soft teachers whom the heart
Obeys!—and art thou not more deeply fill'd
With inspiration from thy Maker sent,
Oh Earth! than in the days tyrannic roar?
And if there be, as noblest minds allow,
A godlike moment, when pure spirits walk
This lower world, where man is doom'd to strive,
Tranquillity adores their presence now!—
GREAT Architect of worlds! whose wond'rous power
Presided o'er creation's natal hour,
Stamp'd man Thy miniature, and bade him run
A race of glory, till his goal be won;
When wan Disease exhales her with'ring breath,
And dims his beauty with the damp of death;
At some still hour the holy sigh will swell,
The gushing tear of gratitude will tell
That Thou art by, to temper and to tame
The trembling anquish of the fever'd frame.
But oh! when heal'd by love and heaven, we rise, With radiant cheek, and re-illumin'd eyes, Bright as a new-born sun, all nature beams, And through the spirit darts immortal dreams! Now for the bracing hills, and healthful plains, And pensive ramble when the noontide wanes;
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