Ev'n filent Night proclaims my foul immortal:
Ev'n filent Night proclaims eternal day.

For human weal, Heav'n husbands all events:

Dull fleep inftructs, nor sport vain dreams in vain. Why, then, their lofs deplore, that are not loft? Why wanders wretched Thought their tombs around, In infidel diftrefs? Are angels there;

Slumbers, rak'd up in duft, ethereal fire?

They live! they greatly live a life on earth
Unkindled, unconceiv'd; and from an eye
Of tenderness, let heav'nly pity fall
On me, more justly number'd with the dead.
This is the defert, this the folitude:
How populous! how vital is the grave!
This is Creation's melancholy vault,
The vale funereal, the fad cypress gloom;
The land of apparitions, empty shades!
All, all on earth is fhadow, all beyond
Is fubftance: the reverfe is Folly's creed:
How folid all, where change shall be no more!
This is the bud of Being, the dim dawn,
The twilight of our day, the vestibule;
Life's theatre, as yet, is fhut; and Death,
Strong Death, alone can heave the maffy bar,
This grofs impediment of clay remove,
And make us embryos of existence free.
From real life, but little more remote
Is he, not yet a candidate, for light,
The future embryo, flumb'ring in his fire.
Embryos we muft be, till we burst the shell,

Yon ambient azure fhell, and fpring to life,
The life of gods, O tranfport! and of man.

Yet man, fool man! here buries all his thoughts; Inters celestial hope without one sigh.

Pris'ner of earth, and pent beneath the Moon,
Here pinions all his wishes; wing'd by Heav'n
To fly at infinite; and reach it there,
Where feraphs gather immortality

On Life's fair tree, faft by the throne of God.
What golden joys ambrofial clustʼring glow,
In His full beam, and ripen for the juft,
Where momentary ages are no more!

WhereTime, and Pain, and Chance, and Death expire!
And is it in the flight of threescore years
To push Eternity from human thought,
And fmother fouls immortal in the dust?
A foul immortal, spending all her fires,
Wafting her ftrength in ftrenuous idleness,
'Thrown into tumult, raptur'd, or alarm'd,
At ought this fcene can threaten, or indulge,
Resembles Ocean into tempeft wrought,

To waft a feather, or to drown a fly.

Where falls this cenfure? It o'erwhelms myself;
How was my heart incrusted by the world!
O how felf-fetter'd was my grov'ling foul!
How, like a worm, was I wrapt round and round
In filken thought, which reptile Fancy spun,
Till darken'd Reafon lay quite clouded o'er
With foft conceit of endless comfort here,
Nor yet put forth her wings to reach the skies !

Night-vifions may befriend (as fung above) :
Our waking dreams are fatal. How I dreamt
Of things impoffible? (Could Sleep do more ?)
Of joys perpetual in perpetual change?
Of stable pleasures on the toffing wave?
Eternal funfhine in the ftorms of life?
How richly were my noon-tide trances hung
With gorgeous tapestries of pictur'd joys?
Joy behind joy, in endless perfpective!
Till, at Death's toll, whose restless iron tongue
Calls daily for his millions at a meal,
Starting I woke, and found myself undone.
Where, now, my phrenfy's pompous furniture?
The cobwebb'd cottage, with its ragged wall
Of mould'ring mud, is royalty to me!
The spider's moft attenuated thread
Is cord, is cable, to man's tender tie
On earthly blifs; it breaks at ev'ry breeze.
O ye bleft scenes of permanent delight!
Full, above measure! lafting, beyond bound!
A perpetuity of bliss is blifs.

Could you, fo rich in rapture, fear an end,
That ghaftly thought would drink up all your joy,
And quite unparadise the realms of light?

Safe are you lodg'd above these rolling spheres ;
The baleful Influence of whofe giddy dance
Sheds fad viciffitude on all beneath.

Here teems with revolutions ev'ry hour;
And rarely for the better; or the best,
More mortal than the common births of Fate.

Each moment has its fickle, emulous

Of Time's enormous scythe, whofe ample sweep
Strikes empires from the root; each moment plays
His little weapon in the narrower sphere
Of sweet domeftic comfort, and cuts down
The fairest bloom of fublunary bliss.

Bliss! fublunary blifs !-Proud words, and vain! Implicit treason to divine decree!

A bold invafion of the rights of Heav'n!
I clafp'd the phantoms, and I found them air.
O had I weigh'd it e'er my fond embrace!
What darts of agony had mifs'd my heart!

Death! Great proprietor of all! 'tis thine
To tread out empire, and to quench the stars.
The fun himself by thy permiffion shines ;
And, one day, thou shalt pluck him from his sphere.
Amid fuch mighty plunder, why exhauft

Thy partial quiver on a mark fo mean?
Why thy peculiar rancour wreak'd on me ?
Infatiate archer! could not one fuffice?

Thy fhaft flew thrice; and thrice my peace was flain;
And thrice, ere thrice yon moon had fill'd her horn.
O Cynthia! why fo pale? Doft thou lament
Thy wretched neighbour? Grieve to fee thy wheel
Of ceafelefs change outwhirl'd in human life?
How wanes my borrow'd blifs! from Fortune's fmile,
Precarious courtefy! Not Virtue's fure,
Self-given, folar, ray of found delight.

In ev'ry vary'd pofture, place, and hour,
How widow'd ev'ry thought of ev'ry joy!

Thought

Thought, bufy thought! too busy for my peace!
Thro' the dark postern of time long elaps'd,
Led foftly, by the ftillness of the night,
Led, like a murderer (and fuch it proves!)
Strays (wretched rover!) o'er the pleafing paft;
In queft of wretchedness perverfely strays;
And finds all defart now; and meets the ghosts]
Of my departed joys; a num'rous train!
I rue the riches of my former fate;
Sweet Comfort's blafted clusters I lament;
I tremble at the bleffings once fo dear;
And ev'ry pleasure pains me to the heart.

Yet why complain? or why complain for one?
Hangs out the fun his luftre but for me,
The fingle man? Are angels all befide?
I mourn for millions: 'tis the common lot;
In this shape, or in that, has fate entail'd
The mother's throes on all of woman born,
Not more the children, than fure heirs of pain.
War, famine, peft, volcano, ftorm, and fire,
Inteftine broils, Oppreffion, with her heart
Wrapt up in triple brafs, befiege mankind.
God's image difinherited of day,

Here, plung'd in mines, forgets a fun was made.
There, beings deathless as their haughty lord,
Are hammer'd to the galling ore for life;
And plow the winter's wave, and reap despair.
Some, for hard mafters, broken under arms,
In battle lopt away, with half their limbs,
Beg bitter bread thro' realms their valour fav',