And mock the warring ocean.
As fond as falfe, the darkness I expect
To hide, and wrap nie in its mantling fhade,
Vain were the thought: for thy unbounded ken
Darts through the thickening gloom, and pries through all
The palpable obfcure. Before thy eyes,
The vanquish'd night throws off her dusky shrowd,
And kindles into day: the fhade, and light,
To man ftill various, but the fame to thee.
On thee, is all the structure of my frame
Dependant. Lock'd within the silent womb,
Sleeping I lay, and ripening to my birth;
Yet, Lord, thy out-ftretch'd arm preferv'd me there;
Before I mov'd to entity, and trod
The verge of being. To thy hallow'd name
I'll pay due honours: for thy mighty hand
Built this corporeal fabrick, when it laid
The ground-work of exiftence. Hence, I read
The wonders of thy art. This frame I view
With terror and delight; and, wrapt in both,
I ftartle at myself. My bones, unform'd
As yet, nor hardening from the viscous parts,
But blended with th' unanimated mass,
Thy eye distinctly view'd; and, while I lay
Within the earth, imperfect, nor perceiv'd
The first faint dawn of life, with ease survey'd
The vital glimmerings of the active feeds,
Juft kindling to existence; and beheld
My fubftance fcarce material. In thy book,
Was the fair model of this structure drawn,
Where every part, in just connection join'd,
Compos'd and perfected th' harmonious piece,
Ere the dim speck of being learn'd to stretch
Its ductile form, or entity had known
To range and wanton in an ampler space.
How dear, how rooted in my inmost soul,
Are all thy counfels, and the various ways
Of thy eternal providence! The fum
So boundless and immenfe, it leaves behind
The low account of numbers; and out-flies
All that imagination e're conceiv'd,
Lefs numerous are the fands that crowd the fhores,
The barriers of the ocean. When I rife
From my foft bed, and fofter joys of sleep,
I rife to thee. Yet lo! the impious flight
Thy mighty wonders. Shall the fons of vice
Elude the vengeance of thy wrathful hand,
And mock thy lingering thunder, which with-holds
Its forky terrors from their guilty heads?
Thou great tremendous God!-Avaunt, and fly,
All ye who thirst for blood.-For, fwoln with pride,
Each haughty wretch blafphemes thy facred name,
And bellows his reproaches to affront
Thy glorious Majefty. Thy foes I hate
Worfe than my own, O Lord! Explore my foul,
See if a flaw or ftain of fin infects
My guilty thoughts. Then, lead me in the way
That guides my feet to thy own heaven and thee.
PSALM the Hundred and Forty-fourth Paraphrafed.
MY foul, in raptures rife to blefs the Lord,
Who taught my hands to draw the fatal sword;
Led by his arm, undaunted I appear
In the first ranks of death, and front of war.
He taught me first the pointed fpear to wield,
And mow the glorious harvest of the field.
By him infpir'd, from ftrength to strength I past,
Plung'd through the troops, and laid the battle waste.
In him my hopes I center and repose,
He guards my life, and shields me from my foes.
He held his ample buckler o'er my head,
And fcreen'd me trembling in the mighty shade:
Against all hoftile violence and power,
He was my fword, my bulwark, and my tower.
He o'er my people will maintain my sway,
And teach my willing subjects to obey.
Lord! what is man, of vile and humble birth?
Sprung with his kindred reptiles from the earth?
That he should thus thy fecret counfels share?
Or what his fon, who challenges thy care?
Why does thine eye regard this nothing, man?
His life a point, his measure but a span ?
The fancy'd pageant of a monent made,
Swift as a dream, and fleeting as a fhade.
Come in thy power, and leave th' ethereal plain,
And to thy harness'd tempeft give the rein;
Yon ftarry arch fhall bend beneath the load,
So loud the chariot, and so great the God!
Soon as his rapid wheels Jehovah rolls,
The folding skies shall tremble to the poles :
Heaven's gaudy axle with the world shall fall,
Leap from the centre, and unhinge the ball.
Touch'd by thy hands, the labouring hills expire
Thick clouds of sinoke, and deluges of fire;
On the tall groves the red destroyer preys,
And wraps th' eternal mountains in the blaze:
Full on my foes may all thy lightnings fly,
On purple pinions through the gloomy sky.
Extend thy hand, thou kind all-gracious God,
Down from the heaven of heavens thy bright abode,
And fhield me from my foes, whofe towering pride
Lowers like a ftorm, and gathers like a tide
Against strange children vindicate my cause,
Who curse thy name, and trample on thy laws;
Who fear not vengeance which they never felt,
Train'd to blafpheme, and eloquent in guilt:
Their hands are impious, and their deeds profane,
They plead their boafted innocence in vain.
Thy name fhall dwell for ever on my tongue,
And guide the facred numbers of my fong;
To thee my Muse shall confecrate her lays,
And every note shall labour in thy praise;
The hallow'd theme fhall teach me how to fing,
Swell on the lyre, and tremble on the ftring.
Oft has thy hand from fight the monarch led,
When death flew raging, and the battle bled;
And fnatch'd thy fervant in the last despair
From all the rifing tumult of the war.
Against ftrange children vindicate my cause,
Who curfe thy name, and trample on thy laws
That our fair fons may fmile in early bloom,
Our fons, the hopes of all our years to come :
Like plants that nurs'd by fostering fhowers arife,
And lift their spreading honours to the skies.
That our chaste daughters may their charms display,
Like the bright pillars of our temple, gay,
Polish'd, and tall, and smooth, and fair as they.
Piled up with plenty let our barns appear,
And burft with all the feasons of the year;
Let pregnant flocks in every quarter bleat,
And drop their tender young in every street.
Safe from their labours may our oxen come,
Safe may they bring the gather'd fummer home.
Oh! may no fighs, no ftreains of forrow flow,
To ftain our triumphs with the tears of woe.
Blefs'd is the nation, how fincerely blefs'd!
Of fuch unbounded happinefs poffefs'd,
To whom Jehovah's facred name is known,
Who claim the God of Ifrael for their own.
The THIRD CHAPTER of JOB.
O B curs'd his birth, and bade his curfes flow
In words of grief, and eloquence of woe;
Loft be that day which dragg'd me to my dooin,
Recent to life, and ftruggling from the womb;
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