With solitary steps I muse,
By thy direction led:
Here, cold to pleasure's tempting forms, Consociate with my sister worms, And mingle with the dead.
Ye midnight horrors, awful gloom! Ye silent regions of the tomb, My future peaceful bed;
Here shall my weary eyes be clos'd, And every sorrow be repos'd In death's refreshing shade.
Ye pale inhabitants of night, Before my intellectual sight, In solemn pomp ascend: O tell how trifling now appears The train of idle hopes and fears That varying life attend!
Ye faithless idols of our sense,
Here own how vain your fond pretence,
Ye empty names of joy,
Your transient forms like shadows pass; Frail offspring of the magic glass Before the mental eye.
The dazzling colours falsely bright, Attract the gazing vulgar sight, With superficial state :
Thro' Reason's clearer optic view'd, Now stripp'd of all its pomp, how rude Appears the painted cheat!
Can wild Ambition's tyrant pow'r, Or ill-got Wealth's superfluous store, The dread of death control?
Can Pleasure's more bewitching charms Avert or soothe the dire alarms
That shake the parting soul?
Religion! ere the hand of fate Shall make reflection plead too late,
My erring senses teach,
Amidst the flatt'ring hopes of youth, To meditate the solemn truth These awful relics preach.
Thy penetrating beams disperse The mist of error, whence our fears Derive their fatal spring:
"Tis thine the trembling heart to warm, And soften to an angel form
The pale terrific king.
When sunk by guilt in sad despair, Repentance breathes her humble pray'r And owns thy threat'nings just; Thy voice the shudd'ring suppliant cheers, With mercy calms her tortur'd fears, And lifts her from the dust.
Sublim'd by thee, the soul aspires, Beyond the rage of low desires, To nobler views elate :
Unmov'd her destin'd change surveys, And arm'd by faith, intrepid pays The universal debt.
In death's soft slumber lull'd to rest, She sleeps, by smiling visions blest, That gently whisper peace:
Till the last morn's fair op'ning ray Unfolds the bright eternal day Of active life and bliss.
GREATEST of Beings! source of life! Sovereign of air and earth and sea! All nature feels thy power, and all A silent homage pay to thee. Wak'd at thy call, the morning sun Pours forth to thee, its earliest rays; And spreads thy glories as it climbs; While raptur'd worlds look up and praise. The moon to the deep shades of night, Speaks the mild lustre of thy name; While all the stars that cheer the scene, Thee the great Lord of light proclaim. And groves and vales, and rocks and hills, And ev'ry flow'r, and ev'ry tree,
Ten thousand creatures, warm with life, Have each a grateful song for thee. But man was form'd to rise to heav'n, And blest with reason's clear light, He views his Maker through his works, And glows with rapture at the sight. Subject to wants, to thee he looks, And from thy goodness seeks supplies; And, when oppress'd with guilt he mourns, Thy mercy lifts him to the skies.
Children whose little minds unform'd, Ne'er rais'd a tender thought to Heav'n; And men, whom reason lifts to God, Though oft by passion downward driven;
Such too, who bend with age
And faint and tremble near the tomb; Who sick'ning at the present scenes, Sigh for that better state to come-
All, great Creator, all are thine; All feel thy providential care : And through each varying stage of life, Alike thy constant pity share.
And whether grief oppress the heart, Or whether joy elate the breast; Or life still keep its little course, Or death invite the heart to rest; All are thy messengers, and all Thy sacred pleasure, Lord, obey; And all are training man to dwell Nearer to bliss, and nearer thee.
WHAT is Eternity? can aught Paint its duration to the thought? Tell ev'ry beam the sun emits, When in sublimest noon he sits; Tell ev'ry light-wing'd mote that strays Within its ample round of rays.—
Tell all the leaves, and all the buds, That crown the gardens, fields, and woods; Tell all the spires of grass the meads Produce when Spring propitious leads
The new-born year;-tell all the drops, That night, upon their bended tops, Sheds, in soft silence, to display Their beauties with the rising day :- Tell all the sands the ocean laves, Tell ocean's ever-changing waves; Or tell, with more laborious pains, The drops its mighty mass contains: Be this astonishing account Augmented, with the full amount Of all the drops the clouds have shed, Where'er their wat❜ry fleeces spread, Through all time's long protracted tour, From Adam to the present hour— -Still short the sum, nor can it vie With the more num'rous years that lie Embosom'd in Eternity.
Were there a belt that could contain In its vast orb, the earth and main; With figures were it cluster'd o'er, Without one cipher in the score; And could your lab'ring thought assign The total of the crowded line-
-How scant th' amount! th' attempt how vain,
To reach Duration's endless chain !
For when as many years are run, Unbounded age is but begun.
Attend, O man, with awe divine; For this Eternity is thine!
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