At this the architects divine on high
Innumerable thrones of glory raise,
On which they, in appointed order, place
The human co-heirs of eternity;
And with united hymns the God incarnate praise,
O holy, holy, holy Lord,
Eternal God, Almighty One,
Be thou for ever, and be thou alone
By all thy creatures conftantly ador'd!
Ineffable co-equal Three,
Who from non-eternity gave birth
To angels, and to men, to heaven, and to earth,
Yet always waft thyself, and will forever be.
But for thy mercy, we had ne'er poffest
These thrones, and this immenfe felicity,
Could ne'er have been fo infinitely bleft:
Therefore all glory, power, dominion, majefty,
To thee, O lamb of God, to thee,
For ever, longer than for ever, be.
Then the incarnate Godhead turns his face
To thofe upon the left, and cries,
(Almighty vengeance flashing in his eyes)
Ye impious, unbelieving race,
To thofe eternal torments go,
Prepar'd for thofe rebellious fons of light,
In burning darkness, and in flaming night;
Which fhall no limit or ceffation know,
But always are extreme, and always will be fo.
The final fentence pass'd; a dreadful cloud,
Inclofing all the miferable croud,
A mighty hurricane of thunder rose,
And hurl'd 'em all into a lake of fire,
Which never, never, never can expire;
The vaft abyfs of endless woes.
Whilft with their God the righteous mount on high,
In glorious triumph paffing thro' the sky,
To joys immenfe, and everlasting ecstasy.
they change, almighty Father! these,
Are but the varied God. The rolling year
Is full of thee. Forth in the pleasing spring
Thy beauty walks, thy tenderness and love.
Wide-flush the fields; the softening air is balm;
Echo the mountains round; the forests live;
And every sense, and every heart is joy.
Then comes thy glory in the fummer months,
With light, and heat, fevere. Prone, then thy fun
Shoots full perfection thro' the fwelling year.
And oft thy voice in awful thunder speaks;
And oft at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve,
By brooks and groves, in hollow-whispering gales.
A yellow-floating pomp, thy bounty fhines
In autumn unconfin'd. Thrown from thy lap,
Profufe o'er nature, falls the lucid shower
Of beamy fruits; and in a radiant stream,
Into the ftores of steril winter pours.
In winter dreadful thou! with clouds and ftorms
Around thee thrown, tempest o'er tempest roll❜d,
Horrible blackness! On the whirlwind's wing,
Riding fublime, thou bidst the world be low,
And humblest nature with thy northern blast.
Mysterious round! what skill, what force divine,
Deep-felt, in these appear! a fimple train,
Yet fo harmonious mix'd, fo fitly join'd,
One following one in fuch inchanting fort,
Shade, unperceiv'd, fo foftening into fhade,
And all fo forming fuch a perfect whole,
That as they ftill fucceed, they ravish ftill.
But wondering oft, with brute unconscious gaze,
Man marks thee not, marks not the mighty hand,
That, ever-bufy, wheels the filent spheres ;
Works in the fecret deep; fhoots, fteaming, thence
The fair profufion that o'erspreads the spring;
Flings from the fun direct the flaming day;
Feeds every creature; hurls the tempest forth;
And, as on earth this grateful change revolves,
With transport touches all the springs of life.
Nature, attend; join every living soul,
Beneath the spacious temple of the sky,
In adoration join; and, ardent, raise
An univerfal hymn! to him, ye gales,
Breathe foft; whofe fpirit teaches you to breathe.
Oh talk of him in folitary glooms!
Where, o'er the rock, the scarcely waving pine
Fills the brown void with a religious awe.
And ye, whofe bolder note is heard afar,
Who shake th' aftonish'd world, lift high to heaven
Th' impetuous fong, and fay from whom you rage.
His praife, ye brooks, attune, ye trembling rills;
And let me catch it as I muse along.
Ye headlong torrents, rapid, and profound;
Ye fofter floods, that lead the humid maze
Along the vale; and thou, majestic main,
A fecret world of wonders in thyself,
Sound his tremendous praise; whose greater voice
Or bids you rore, or bids your roarings fall.
Roll up your incenfe, herbs, and fruits, and flowers,
In mingled clouds to him, whose fun elates,
Whofe hand perfumes you, and whofe pencil paints,
Ye forests bend; ye harvests, wave to him:
Breathe your ftill fong into the reaper's heart,
Homeward, rejoicing with the joyous moon.
Ye that keep watch in heaven, as earth afleep
Unconscious lyes, effuse your milded beams,
Ye conftellations, while your angels ftrike,
Amid the fpangling sky, the filver lyre.
Great fource of day! best image here below
Of thy Creator, ever darting wide,
From world to world, the vital ocean round,
On nature write with every beam his praise.
The thunder rolls: be hufh'd the proftrate world;
While cloud to cloud returns the dreadful hymn,
Bleat out a fresh, ye hills; ye moffy rocks,
Retain the found; the broad refponfive low,
Ye valleys, raife; for the great fhepherd reigns;
And yet again the golden age returns.
Wildest of creatures, be not filent here
But, hymning horrid, let the desart rore,
Ye woodlands all, awake: a general fong
Burft from the groves; and when the restless day
Expiring, lays the warbling world asleep,
Sweeteft of birds! fweet Philomela, charm
The liftening fhades; and thro' the midnight hour,
Trilling, prolong the wildly lucious note;
That night, as well as day, may vouch his praise.
Ye chief, for whom the whole creation fmiles;
At once the head, the heart, and mouth of all,
Crown the great hymn ! in swarming cities vaft
Concourfe of men, to the deep organ join
The long refounding voice, oft breaking clear,
At folemn paufes, thro' the fwelling base ;
And as each mingling frame increases each,
In one united ardor rife to heaven.
Or if you rather chuse the rural shade,
To find a fan in every facred grove,
There let the shepherd's flute, the virgin's chaunt,
The prompting feraph, and the poet's lyre,
Still ling the God of seasons as they roll.
For me, when I forget the darling theme,
Whether the bloffom blows, the fummer-ray
Ruffets the plain, delicious autumn gleams,
Or winter rises in the reddening east ;
Be my tongue mute, my fancy paint no more,
And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat.
Should fate command me to the farthest verge
Of the green earth, to hoitile barbarous climes,
Rivers unknown to fong; where first the fun
Gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam
Flames on th' Atlantic ifles; 'tis nought to me;
Since God is ever present, ever felt,
In the void waste, as in the city full;
Rolls the fame kindred seasons rouud the world,
In all apparent, wife, and good in all;
Since he fuftains, and animates the whole
From feeming evil ftill educes good,
And better thence again, and better still,
In infinite progression. But I lofe
Myfelf in him, in light ineffable!
Come then, expreffive filence, muse his praise.
The First PSALM imitated, in a Pindaric Ode.
APPY, O! happy is his ftate,
Whose thoughts are always right;
Whose zeal the wicked can't abate,
Whom no ill words delight;
But who the law of God pursues,
In all he thinks, in all he does,
And, only earnest to obey,
Makes it his study night and day.
Like fome fair tree a brook befide,
Whose waters nourish as they glide,
And keep it ever green;
Which bloffoms cover in the spring,
Which autumn's golden honours bring;
So fhall this man be seen.
For God, in whom he puts his trust,
Is ever good, is ever just,
And will his righteous fervant give
Wherewith in peace and joy to live.
But hapless is the finner's fate,
Whofe thoughts to error tend;
To whom examples laws create,
Whom every wind can bend.
Fictitious hope his fancy feeds;
He, restless, toils, yet ne'er fucceeds;
But fees the profpects he defign'd
Difpers'd like chaff before the wind.
Such is the order here of things,
Which from the wifest being springs,
That evil works in vain ;
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