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Where joy (if joy) but heightens our distress,
So foon to perish, and revive no more?
The greater fuch a joy, the more it pains.
A world, fo far from great, (and yet how great
It fhines to thee!) there's nothing real in it ;
Being, a fhadow! confcioufnefs, a dream!
A dream, how dreadful! univerfal blank
Before it, and behind! Poor man, a spark
From non-existence ftruck by wrath divine,
Glitt'ring a moment, nor that moment fure,
'Midft upper, nether, and surrounding night,
His fad, fure, fudden, and eternal tomb!

LORENZO! doft thou feel these arguments!
Or is there nought but vengeance can be felt?
How haft thou dar'd the DEITY dethrone?
How dar'd india Him of a world like this?
If fuck the world, creation was a crime;
For what is crime, but cause of misery?
Retract, Blafphemer! and unriddle this,
Of endless arguments, above, below,
Without us, and within, the fhort result-
"If man's immortal, there's a GOD in Heav'n."
But wherefore fuch redundancy, fuch wafte
Of argument? One fets my foul at reft;
One obvious, and at hand, and, oh !-at heart,
So just the skies, PHILANDER's life fo pain❜d,
His heart fo pure, that, or fucceeding scenes,
Have palms to give, or ne'er had he been born.
"What an old tale is this! LORENZO cries.
is old; but truth
No years impair: And had not this been true,
Thou never hadft defpis'd it for its age.
Truth is immortal as thy foul; and fable
As fleeting as thy joys: Be wife, nor make
Heav'n's higheft bleffing, vengeance; O be wife!
Nor make a curfe of immortality.

I grant the argument

Say, know'st thou what it is, or what thou art? Know'it thou th' importance of a soul immortal? Behold this midnight glory; worlds on worlds

Amazing pomp? Redouble this amaze;

Ten thoufand add: add twice ten thousand more; Then weigh the whole; One foul outweighs them all ; And calls th' aftonishing magniscence

Of unintelligent creation poor.

For this believe not me ; no man believe :

;

Truft not in words, but deeds; and deeds no lefs.
Than thofe of the SUPREME; nor his, a few
Confult them all; confulted, all proclaim.
Thy foul's importance: Tremble at thyself,
For whom Omnipotence has wak'd fo long;
Has wak'd and work'd, for ages; from the birth
Of Nature, to this unbelieving hour..

In this fmall province of His vaft domain
(All Nature bow, while I pronounce his name!)
What has GoD done, and not for this fole end,
To refcue fouls from death? The foul's high price
Is writ on all the conduct of the Skies.

The foul's high price is the Creation's key.
Unlocks its mylteries, and naked lays
The genuine cause of ev'ry deed divine:
That is the chain of ages, which maintains
Their obvious correfpondence, and unites
Moft diftant periods in one bleft design:
That is the mighty hinge, on which have turn'd
All revolutions, whether we regard
The nat❜ral, civil, or religious world;

The former two, but fervants to the third :-
To that their duty done, they both expire ;
Their mass new-caft; forgot their deeds renown'd:
And angels afk," Where once they fbone fo fair;"
To lift us from this abject, to fublime;
This flux, to permanent; this dark, to day;
This foul, to pure; this turbid, to ferene;
This mean, to mighty! For this glorious end,
Th' ALMIGHTY, riling, his long Sabbath broke ;
The world was made; was ruin'd; was reftor'd;
Laws from the fkies were publish'd; were repeal'd:
On earth kings, kingdoms, rofe; kings, kingdoms, fell;

Fam'd fages lighted up the Pagan world;
Prophets from Sion darted a keen glance
Thro' diftant age; faints travell'd; martyrs bled:
By wonders, facred Nature flood controul'd;
The living were tranflated; dead were rais'd;
Angels, and more than angels, came from heav'n;
And, oh! for this, defcended lower ftill!
Guilt was hell's gloom; aftonish'd at his gueft,
For one fhort moment LUCIFER ador'd:
LORENZO and wilt thou do lefs -For this,
That hallow'd page, fools fcoff at, was inspir'd,
Of all thefe truths thrice-venerable code!
Deifts! perform your quarantine; and then.
Fall proftrate, ere you touch it, left you die...
Nor lefs intenfely bent infernal pow'rs
To mar, than thofe of light, this end to gain
O what a scene is here!-LORENZO! wake;
Rife to the thought; exert, expand thy foul-
To take the valt idea: It denies

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All elfe the name of great.. Two warring worlds
Not Europe against Afric; warring worlds;
Of more than mortal! mounted on the wing?
On ardent wings of energy and zeal,
High-hov ring o'er this little brand of ftrife!
This fublunary ball-But ftrife, for what?
In their own eaufe conflicting? no; in thine,
In man's. His fingle intreft blows the flame ;
His the fole ftake; his fate the trumpet founds,
Which kindles war immortal. How it burns ;
Tumultuous fwarms of deities in arms!

Force, force oppofing, till the waves run high,
And tempeft Nature's univerfal sphere,
Such oppofites eternal, ftedfast, stern,
Such foes implacable, are good and ill

[them.

Yet man, vain man, would mediate peace between Think not this fiction." There was war in heav`n.” From Heav'n's high cryftal mountain, where it hung; Th' ALMIGHTY's out-firetch'd arm took down his And fhot his indignation at the deep:

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Re-thunder'd hell, and darted all her fires.-
And feems the stake of little moment ftill!

And flumbers man, who fingly caus'd the storm?
He fleeps. And art thou shock'd at mysteries?
The greatest, thou, How dreadful to reflect,
What ardour, care, and counsel, mortals cause
In breafts divine! how little in their own;

Where-e'er I turn, how new proofs pour upon me!
How happily this won'drous view fupports
My former argument! how ftrongly frikes
Immortal life's full demonftration, here!
Why this exertion ? why this ftrange regard
From Heav'n's Omnipotent indulg'd to man?
Becaufe, in man, the glorious dreadful pow'r,
Extremely to be pain'd, or bleft, for ever.
Duration gives importance; fwells the price.
An angel, if a creature of a day,

What would he be ? A trifle of no weight?
Or ftand, or fall; no matter which; he's gone.
Because IMMORTAL, there fore is indulg'd

This frange regard of Deities to duft.

Hence, Heav'n looks down on earth with all her eyes;

Hence, the foul's mighty moment in her fight;

Hence, ev'ry foul has partifans above,

And ev'ry thought a critic in the skies:
Hence clay, vile clay! has angels for its guard,
And ev'ry guard a paffion for his charge:
Hence, from all age, the Cabinet Divine
Has held high council o'er the fate of man.
Nor have the clouds thofe gracious counfels bid.
Angels undrew the curtain of the throne,

And PROVIDENCE came forth to meet mankind;
In various modes of emphafis, and awe,

He spoke his will, and trembling Nature heard;
He fpoke it loud, in thunder, and in ftorm.
Witnefs, thou Sinai ! whofe cloud-cover'd height,
And fhaken bafis, own'd the present GoD:
Witnefs, ye billows! whofe returning tide,
Breaking the chain that faften'd it in air,

Swept Egypt, and her menaces, to hell:
Witnefs, ye flames! the Affyrian tyrant blew
To sev nfold rage, as impotent, as ftrong;
And thou, earth! witnefs, whofe expanding jaws
Clos do'er prefumption s facrilegious fons*
Has not each element, in turn, fubfcrib'd
The foul's high price, and fworn it to the wife
Has not flame, ocean, ether, earthquake, ftrove -
To ftrike this truth thro' adamantine man?

If not all-adamant, LORENZO! hear :
All is delufion; nature is wrapt up,

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In tenfold night, from reafon's keenest eye;
There's no confiftence, meaning, plan, or end,
In all beneath the fun, in all above,
(As far as man can penetrate), or Heav'n
Is an immenfe, ineftimable prize;;
Or all is nothing, or that prize is all.
And shall each toy be ftill a match for Heav'n,
And full equivalent for groans below?
Who would not give a trifle to prevent,
What he would give a thousand worlds to cure ?
LORENZO! thou haft feen (if thine, to fee)
All nature and her GOD (by nature's course,
And nature's courfe controul'd) declare for me ; ✩
The Skies above proclaim " Immortal man!"
And Man immortal!". all below refounds.
The world is a fyftem of theology,

Read by the greateft ftrangers to the fchools;
If boneft, learn'd; and fages, o'er a plough.
Is not LORENZo then impos'd on thee
This hard alternative; or to renounce
Thy reafon, and thy fenfe; or to believe?
What then is unbelief? Tis an exploit
A ftrenuous enterprise; To gain it, man
Muft burst thro' every bar of common sense,
Of common fhame, magnanimously wrong,
And what rewards the fturdy combatant?
His prize, repentance; infamy, his crown.

* Korah &c.

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