But when I drop mine eye, and look on man,
Thy right regain'd, thy grandeur is reftor'd,
O Nature! wide flies off the expanding round.
As when whole magazines, at once, are fir'd,
The fmitten air is hollow'd by the blow;
The vat difplofion diffipates the clouds;
Shock'd æther's billows dash the distant kies;
Thus (but far more) th' expanding round flies off,
And leaves a mighty void, a spacious womb,
Might teem with new creation; re-inflam'd
Thy luminaries triumph, and affume
Divinity themselves. Nor was it ftrange,
Matter high-wrought to fuch furprizing pomp,
Such godlike glory, stole the style of gods,
From ages dark, obtufe, and ftcep'd in sense;
For, fure, to fenfe, they truly are divine;
And half-abfolv'd idolatry from guilt;
Nay, turn'd it into virtue. Such it was
In thofe, who put forth all they had of man
Unloft, to lift their thought, nor mounted higher;
But, weak of wings, on planets perch'd; and thought 810
What was their higheft, must be their ador'd.
But They how weak, who could no higher mount? And are there, then, Lorenzo! Thofe, to whom
Unfeen, and Unexiftent, are the fame ?
And if incomprehenfible is join'd,
Who dare pronounce it madness, to believe?
Why has the mighty Builder thrown afide
All measure in His work; ftretch'd out His line
So far, and spread amazement o'er the whole?
Then (as He took delight in wide extremes),
Deep in the bofom of His universe,
Dropt down that reasoning mite, that infe&t, man,
To crawl, and gaze, and wonder at the scene?
That man might ne'er prefume to plead amazement
For disbelief of wonders in himself.
Shall God be lefs miraculous, than what
His hand has form'd ? Shall mysteries descend
From un-myfterious? Things more elevate,
Be more familiar? Uncreated lie
More obvious than Created, to the grafp
Of human thought? The more of wonderful
Is heard in Him, the more we should affent.
Could we conceive Him, God He could not be;
Or He not God, or we could not be men.
A God alone can comprehend a God;
Man's distance how immenfe! On fuch a theme,
Know this, Lorenzo! (feem it ne'er fo ftrange)
Nothing can fatisfy, but what confounds ;
Nothing, but what aftonishes, is true.
The scene thou feeft, attests the truth I fing,
And every ftar fheds light upon thy creed.
These stars, this furniture, this cost of heaven,
If but reported, thou hadft ne'er believ'd;
But thine eye tells thee, the romance is true.
The grand of nature is th' Almighty's oath,
In reason's court, to filence unbelief.
How my mind, opening at this fcene, imbibes
The moral emanations of the skies,
While nought, perhaps, Lorenzo fefs admires!
Has the Great Sovereign sent ten thousand worlds
To tell us, He refides above them All,
In glory's unapproachable recefs?
And dare earth's bold inhabitants deny
The fumptuous, the magnific embassy
A moment's audience? Turn we, nor will hear
From whom they come, or what they would impart
For man's emolument; fole cause that stoops
Their grandeur to man's eye? Lorenzo! roufe;
Let thought, awaken'd, take the lightning's wing,
And glance from east to west, from pole to pole. 860
Who fees, but is confounded, or convinc'd?
Renounces Reafon, or a God adores?
Mankind was fent into the world to see :
Sight gives the science needful to their peace;
That obvious fcience afks fmall learning's aid.
Wouldst thou on metaphyfic pinions foar?
Or wound thy patience amid logic thorns ?
Or travel history's enormous round ?
Nature no fuch hard talk injoins: She gave
A make to man directive of his thought;
A make fet upright, painting to the stars,
As who fhall fay, " Read thy chief leffon there."
Too late to read this manufcript of heaven,
When, like a parchment-fcroll, fhrunk up by flames, It folds Lorenzo's leffon from his fight.
Leffon how various! Not the God alone,
I fee His Minifters; I fee, diffus'd
In radiant orders, effences fublime,
Of various offices, of varicus plume,
In heavenly liveries, diftinctly clad,
Azure, green, purple, pearl, or downy gold,
Or all commix'd; they stand, with wings outspread,
Liftening to catch the Master's least command,
And fly through Nature, ere the moment ends;
Numbers innumerable !-Well conceiv'd
By Pagan, and by Chriftian! O'er each sphere
Prefides an angel, to direct its course,
And feed, or fan, its flames; or to discharge
Other high trufts unknown. For who can see
Such pomp of matter, and imagine, Mind,
For which alone Inanimate was made,
More fparingly difpens'd? That nobler fon,
Far liker the great Sire !-'Tis thus the skies
Inform us of fuperiors numberless,
As much, in Excellence, above mankind,
As above Earth, in Magnitude, the Spheres.
Thefe, as a cloud of witnesses, hang o'er us;
In a throng'd theatre are all our deeds;
perhaps, a thoufand demigods defcend
On every beam we fee, to walk with men.
Aweful reflection! Strong restraint from ill!
Yet, here, our virtue finds still stronger aid From thefe ethereal glories Senfe furveys. Something, like magic, ftrikes from this blue vault; With juft attention is it view'd? We feel
A fudden fuccour, unimplor'd, unthought;
Nature herself does half the work of Man.
Seas, rivers, mountains, forefts, defarts, rocks,
The promontory's height, the depth profound
Of fubterranean, excavated grots,
Black brow'd, and vaulted high, and yawning wide
From Nature's structure, or the scoop of Time;
If ample of dimenfion, vaft of size,
Ev'n These an aggrandizing impulfe give;
Of folemn thought enthufiaftic heights
Ev'n Thefe infufe.-But what of vaft in These?
Nothing-or we must own the skies forgot.
Much lefs in Art.-Vain Art! Thou pigmy power!
How doft thou swell and strut, with human pride,
To fhew thy littlenefs! What childish toys,
Thy watery columns fquirted to the clouds !
Thy bafon'd rivers, and imprifon'd feas!
Thy mountains moulded into forms of men!
Thy hundred-gated Capitals! or Thofe
Where three days travel left us much to ride;
Gazing on miracles by mortals wrought,
Arches triumphal, theatres immenfe,
Or nodding Gardens pendent in mid-air!
Or Temples proud to meet their Gods half-way!
Yet Thefe affect us in no common kind.
What then the force of fuch superior scenes ?
Enter a temple, it will strike an awe :
What awe from This the Deity has built?
A Good Man feen, though filent, counsel gives:
The touch'd fpectator wishes to be wife:
In a bright mirror His own hands have made,
Here we fee fomething like the face of God.
"Seems it not then enough, to say, Lorenzo!
To man abandon'd, " Haft thou seen the skies ?”
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