Not so; thy pasture richer, but remote;
In part, remote; for that remoter part
Man bleats from instinct, though, perhaps, debauch'd
By Sense, his Reason sleeps, nor dreams the cause. 50
The cause how obvious, when his Reason wakes!
His grief is but his grandeur in disguise;
And discontent is immortality.
Shall sons of æther, shall the blood of Heav'n,
Set up their hopes on earth, and stable here
With brutal acquiescence in the mire?
LORENZO! no! they shall be nobly pain'd;
The glorious foreigners, distrest, shall sigh
On thrones; and thou congratulate the sigh:
Man's misery declares him born for bliss;
His anxious heart asserts the truth I sing,
And gives the sceptic in his head the lie.
Our heads, our hearts, our passions, and our pow'rs,
Speak the same language; call us to the skies:
Unripen'd these in this inclement clime,
Scarce rise above conjecture and mistake;
And for this land of trifles those too strong
Tumultuous rise, and tempest human life:
What prize on earth can pay us for the storm?
Meet objects for our passions Heav'n ordain'd,
Objects that challenge all their fire, and leave
No fault, but in defect: Blest Heav'n! avert
A bounded ardour for unbounded bliss;
O for a bliss unbounded! Far beneath
A soul immortal, is a mortal joy.
Nor are our pow'rs to perish immature;
But, after feeble effort here, beneath
A brighter sun, and in a nobler soil,
Transplanted from this sublunary bed,
Shall flourish fair, and put forth all their bloom.
Reason progressive, Instinct is complete;
Swift Instinct leaps; slow Reason feebly climbs.
Brutes soon their zenith reach; their little all
Flows in at once; in ages they no more
Could know, or do, or covet, or enjoy.
Were Man to live coëval with the sun,
The patriarch pupil would be learning still;
Yet, dying, leave his lesson half-unlearnt.
Men perish in advance, as if the sun
Should set ere noon, in eastern oceans drown'd;
(If fit, with dim, illustrious to compare,
The sun's meridian with the soul of Man.)
To Man, Why, step-dame Nature so severe?
Why thrown aside thy master-piece half-wrought, While meaner efforts thy last hand enjoy?
Or, if abortively, poor Man must die,
Nor reach, what reach he might, why die in dread? Why curst with foresight? Wise to misery?
Why of his proud prerogative the prey?
Why less pre-eminent in rank, than pain?
His immortality alone can tell;
Full ample fund to balance all amiss,
And turn the scale in favour of the just!
His immortality alone can solve
That darkest of enigmas, human hope;
Of all the darkest, if at death we die.
Hope, eager Hope, th' assassin of our joy,
All present blessings treading under foot,
Is scarce a milder tyrant than Despair.
With no past toils content, still planning new,
Hope, cager hope, the assassin of our joy.
All present blessings treading underfoot
London Published Sept. 23-1797 by THeptinstall 30 4 High Holborn
Hope turns us o'er to Death alone for ease.
Possession, why, more tasteless than Pursuit?
Why is a wish far dearer than a crown?
That wish accomplish'd, why, the grave of bliss?
Because, in the great future bury'd deep,
Beyond our plans of empire, and renown,
Lies all that Man with ardour should pursue;
And HE who made him, bent him to the right.
Man's heart th' ALMIGHTY to the future sets,
By secret and inviolable springs;
And makes his hope his sublunary joy.
Man's heart eats all things, and is hungry still;
"More, more!" the glutton cries: For something new
So rages appetite, if Man can't mount,
He will descend. He starves on the possest.
Hence, the world's master, from ambition's spire,
In CAPREA plung'd; and div'd beneath the brute.
In that rank sty why wallow'd empire's son
Supreme? Because he could no higher fly;
His riot was ambition in despair.
Old ROME consulted birds; LORENZO! thou,
With more success, the flight of Hope survey;
Of restless Hope, for ever on the wing.
High-perch'd o'er ev'ry thought, that falcon sits,
To fly at all that rises in her sight;
And, never stooping, but to mount again
Next moment, she betrays her aim's mistake,
And owns her quarry lodg'd beyond the grave.
There should it fail us (it must fail us there,
If being fails,) more mournful riddles rise,
And Virtue vies with Hope in mystery.
Why Virtue? Where its praise, its being, fled?
Virtue is true self-interest pursu❜d:
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