A thousand worlds, if we with him compare,
Less than fo many drops of water are.
Men take no pleasure but in new designs:
And what they hope for what they have outshines.
Our sheep and oxen seem no more to crave;
With full content feeding on what they have:
Vex not themfelves for an encrease of store;
But think to-morrow we shall give them more..
What we from day to day receive from Heaven,
They do from us expect it should be given.
We made them not, yet they on us rely;
More than vain men upon the Deity:
More beasts than they! that will not understand,
That we are fed from his immediate hand,
Man, that in him has Being, moves and lives,,
What can he have or ufe but what he gives?
So that no bread can nourishment afford,
Or useful be, without his Sacred Word.
ARTH praises conquerors for fhedding blood: Heaven, thofe that love their foes, and do them good.
It is terrestrial honour, to be crown'd
For ftrowing men, like rushes, on the ground.
True glory 'tis to rife above them all,
Without th' advantage taken by their fall.
He that in fight diminishes mankind,
Does no addition to his ftature find:
But he that does a noble nature show,
Obliging others, ftill does higher grow.
For virtue practis'd such an habit gives,
That among men he like an Angel lives.
Humbly he doth, and without envy, dwell;
Lov'd and admir'd by those he does excell.
Fools anger fhew, which politicians hide:
Bleft with this fear, men let it not abide.
The humble man, when he receives a wrong,
Refers revenge to whom it doth belong.
Nor fees he reason why he should engage,
Or vex his fpirit, for another's rage.
Plac'd on a rock, vain men he pities, toft
On raging waves, and in the tempest lost.
The rolling planets and the glorious fun
Still keep that order which they first begun:
They their first lesson constantly repeat,
Which their Creator, as a law, did fet.
Above, below, exactly all obey:
But wretched men have found another way;
Knowledge of good and evil, as at first,
(That vain perfuafion!) keeps them still accurft!
The Sacred Word refusing as a guide,
Slaves they become to luxury and pride.
As clocks, remaining in the skilful hand
Of fome great mafter, at the figure stand;
But when abroad, neglected they do
At random ftrike, and the false hour do show:
So from our Maker wandering, we stray;
Like birds that know not to their nefts the way.
In him we dwelt before our exile here:
And may, returning, find contentment there:
True joy may find, perfection of delight;
Behold his face, and fhun eternal night.
Silence, my Muse! make not these jewels cheap,
Expofing to the world too large an heap.
Of all we read, the Sacred Writ is beft;
Where great truths are in fewest words expreft.
Wrestling with death, these lines I did indite;
No other theme could give my foul delight.
O, that my youth had thus employ'd my pen!
Or that I now could write as well as then!
But 'tis of grace, if sickness, age, and pain,
Are felt as throes, when we are born again:
Timely they come to wean us from this earth;
As pangs that wait upon a second birth,
Occafioned upon fight of the LIIId Chapter of Isaiah, turned into Verfe by Mrs. Wharton.
POET we prize, when in their verfe we find
Some great employment of a worthy mind,
Angels have been inquifitive to know
The fecret, which this oracle does fhow.
What was to come, Isaiah did declare;
Which the defcribes, as if she had been there;
Had feen the wounds, which to the reader's view
She draws fo lively, that they bleed anew.
As ivy thrives, which on the oak takes hold:
So, with the Prophet's, may her lines grow old!
If they fhould die, who can the world forgive,
(Such pious lines!) when wanton Sappho's live?
Who with his breath his image did infpire,
Expects it fhould foment a nobler fire
Not love which brutes, as well as men may know;
But love like his, to whom that breath we owe.
Verse fo defign'd, on that high fubje&t wrote,
Is the perfection of an ardent thought;
|