A

CONTEMPLATION

Ο Ν

N I G HT.

WHETHER amid the gloom of night I ftray,

Or my glad eyes enjoy revolving day,

Still Nature's various face informs my sense,
Of an all-wife, all-powerful Providence.

gay

When the fun first breaks the shades of night, And strikes the distant eastern hills with light, Colour returns, the plains their livery wear, And a bright verdure clothes the fmiling year; The blooming flowers with opening beauties glow, And grazing flocks their milky fleeces show; The barren cliffs with chalky fronts arise, And a pure azure arches o'er the skies. But, when the gloomy reign of Night returns, Stript of her fading pride all nature mourns : The trees no more their wonted verdure boast, But weep in dewy tears their beauty loft: No diftant landscapes draw our curious eyes; Wrapt in Night's robe the whole creation lies. Yet ftill, e'en now, while darkness clothes the land, We view the traces of th' Almighty hand;

Millions of ftars in heaven's wide vault

appear,

And with new glories hangs the boundless sphere:
The filver moon her western couch forfakes,
And o'er the fkies her nightly circle makes;

Her

THOUGH T

ON

E TE R NIT Y.

.

ERE the foundations of the world were laid,
Ere kindling light th' Almighty word obey'd,
Thou wert; and when the subterraneous flame
Shall burst its prison, and devour this frame,
From angry heaven when the keen lightning flies,
When fervent heat diffolves the melting skies,
Thou ftill fhalt be; ftill as thou wert before,
And know no change, when Time shall be no more.
O endless thought! divine Eternity!

Th' immortal foul shares but a part of thee;
For thou wert present when our life began,
When the warm duft shot up in breathing man.

Ah! what is life? with ills encompass'd round,
Amidst our hopes, Fate ftrikes the fudden wound:
To-day the statesman of new honour dreams,
To-morrow Death destroys his airy fchemes;
Is mouldy treasure in thy cheft confin'd?
Think all that treasure thou must leave behind;
Thy heir with fmiles fhall view thy blazon'd hearse,
And all thy hoards with lavish hand disperse.
Should certain fate th' impending blow delay,
Thy mirth will ficken, and thy bloom decay;

Then

Then feeble

age will all thy nerves difarm,

No more thy blood its narrow channels warm.
Who then would wish to stretch this narrow fpan,
To fuffer life beyond the date of man?

The virtuous foul pursues a nobler aim,
And life regards but as a fleeting dream:
She longs to wake, and wishes to get free,
To launch from earth into eternity.

For, while the boundless theme extends our thought, Ten thousand thousand rolling years are nought.

A N

EPIGRAMMATICAL EXPOSTULATION*.

FROM Mohock and from Hawkubite,

Good Lord, deliver me;

Who wander through the streets by night,

Committing cruelty.

They flash our fons with bloody knives,

And on our daughters fall;
And if they ravish not our wives,

We have good luck withal.

Coaches and chairs they overturn,

Nay carts moft easily:

Therefore from Gog, and eke Magog,

Good Lord, deliver me!

* Annexed, in 1712, to Gay's "Wonderful Prophecy, &c."

humorous treatife on the Mohocks.

EPI