Our father, pale with grief and watching grown,
Takes our cold hand in his, and cries, adieu !
Adieu, my child! now I must follow you :
Then weeps, and gently lays it down.
Our fons, who, in their tender years,
Were objects of our cares, and of our fears,
Come trembling to our bed, and, kneeling, cry,
Bless us, O father! now before you die;
Bless us, and be you bless'd to all eternity.
Our friend, whom equal to ourselves we love,
Compaffionate and kind,

Cries, will you leave me here behind?
Without me fly to the blefs'd feats above?
Without me, did I fay? Ah, no!
Without thy friend thou canst not go :
For, though thou leav'ft me groveling here below,
My foul with thee fhall upward fly,

And bear thy fpirit company,

Through the bright paffage of the yielding sky.
Ev'n death, that parts thee from thyself, shall be
Incapable to feparate

(For 'tis not in the power of fate)

My friend, my best, my dearest friend, and me:
But, fince it must be fo, farewell;

For ever! No; for we fhall meet again,
And live like gods, though now we die like men,
In the eternal regions, where just spirits dwell.

The foul, unable longer to maintain
The fruitless and unequal ftrife,
Finding her weak endeavours vain,
To keep the counterscarp of life,
By flow degrees, retires towards the heart,
And fortifies that little fort

With all its kind artilleries of art;
Botanic legions guarding every port.
But death, whofe arms no mortal can repel,
A formal fiege difdains to lay;

Summons his fierce battalions to the fray,
And in a minute ftorms the feeble citadel.
Sometimes we may capitulate, and he
Pretends to make a folid peace;
But 'tis all fham, all artifice,

That we may négligent and careless be:
For, if his armies are withdrawn to-day,
And we believe no danger near,
But all is peaceable, and all is clear;
His troops return fome unsuspected way;
While in the foft embraces of fleep we lie,
The fecret murderers ftab us, and we die.

Since our first parents' fall,
Inevitable death defcends on all;

A portion none of human race can mifs
But that which makes it fweet or bitter, is
The fears of mifery, or certain hopes of bliss.
For, when th' impenitent and wicked die,

Loaded with crimes and infamy;

If any fenfe at that fad time remains,
They feel amazing terrors, mighty pains;
The earnest of that vaft, ftupendous woe.
Which they to all eternity must undergo,
Confin'd in hell with everlasting chains.
Infernal spirits hover in the air.
Like ravenous wolves, to seize upon the prey.
And hurry the departed fouls away
To the dark receptacles of defpair :

Where they must dwell till that tremendous day,
When the loud trump fhall call them to appear
Before a Judge most terrible, and most severe
By whofe juft fentence they must go

To everlasting pains, and endless woe.

But the good man, whofe foul is pure,
Unfpotted, regular, and free

From all the ugly stains of luft and villainy,
Of mercy and of pardon fure,

Looks through the darkness of the gloomy night: And fees the dawning of a glorious day; Sees crowds of angels ready to convey

His foul whene'er the takes her flight

To the furprizing manfions of immortal light..
Then the celestial guards around him stand;
Nor fuffer the black dæmons of the air
T'oppose his paffage to the promis'd land,
Or terrify his thoughts with wild defpair;
But all is calm within, and all without is fair.

Y 3

His

f

His prayers, his charity, his virtues, prefs
To plead for mercy when he wants it most;
Not one of all the happy number 's loft:

And those bright advocates ne'er want success,
But when the foul 's releas'd from dull mortality,
She paffes up in triumph through the sky;
Where he's united to a glorious throng
Of angels; who, with a celeftial fong,
Congratulate her conqueft as fhe flies along.

If therefore all muft quit the stage,
When, or how foon, we cannot know;
But, late or early, we are fure to go;

In the fresh bloom of youth, or wither'd age;
We cannot take too fedulous a care,

In this important, grand affair:

For, as we die, we must remain;
Hereafter all our hopes are vain,

To make our peace with Heaven, or to return again.
The heathen, who no better understood

Than what the light of nature taught, declar'd,

No future mifery could be prepar'd

For the fincere, the merciful, the good;

But, if there was a state of reft,

They should with the fame happiness be bleft
As the immortal gods, if gods there were, poffeft,
We have the promise of th' eternal truth,
Those who live well, and pious paths pursue,
To man, and to their Maker, true,

Let them expire in age, or youth,

Can

Can never mifs

Their way to everlasting blifs :

But from a world of mifery and care
To manfions of eternal ease repair;

Where joy in full perfection flows,
And in an endlefs circle moves,
Through the vast round of beatific love,
Which no ceffation knows

ΟΝ ΤΗ Ε

GENERAL CONFLAGRATION,

AND ENSUING JUDGEMENT.

A PINDARIC ESSAY.

"Effe quoque in fatis, reminifcitur, affore tempus Quo mare, quo tellus, correptaque regia cæli "Ardeat, & mundi moles operofa laborat." OVID. Met.

N

OW the black days of universal doom,

Which wondrous prophecies foretold, are come :
What ftrong convulfions, what ftupendous woe,
Muft finking nature undergo;

Amidst the dreadful wreck, and final overthrow!
Methinks I hear her, confcious of her fate,

With fearful groans, and hideous cries,
Fill the prefaging skies;