Where the prime actors of the last year's scene; Their port fo proud, their buskin, and their plume? How many fleep, who kept the world awake With luftre, and with noife! Has Death proclaim'd A truce, and hung his fated launce on high? 'Tis brandifh'd ftill; nor fhall the prefent year Be more tenacious of her human leaf, Or fpread of feeble life a thinner fall.
But needlefs monuments to wake the thought;
Life's gayest fcenes fpeak man's mortality;
Tho' in a style more florid, full as plain,
As mausoleums, pyramids, and tombs.
What are our nobleft ornaments, but deaths
Turn'd flatterers of life, in paint or marble,
The well-ftain'd canvas, or the featur'd stone?
Our fathers grace, or rather haunt, the fcene:
Joy peoples her pavillion from the dead.
"Profest diversions! cannot these escape ?"
Far fromit: Thefe prefent us with a shroud;
And talk of death, like garlands o'er a grave.
As fome bold plunderers, for bury'd wealth,
We ranfack tombs for pastime; from the duft
Call up the fleeping hero; bid him tread
The fcene for our amufement; How like gods
We fit; and, wrapt in immortality,
Shed gen'rous tears on wretches born to die;
Their fate deploring, to forget our own!
What, all the pomps, and triumphs of our lives,
But legacies in bloffom? Our lean foil
Luxuriant grown, and rank in vanities.
From friends interr'd beneath; a rich manure!
Like other worms, we banquet on the dead;
Like other worms fhall we crawl on, nor know
Our prefent frailties, or approaching fate?
LORENZO! fuch the glories of the world!
What is the world icelf? Thy world ?—A
grave
Where is the duft that has not been alive?
The fpade, the plough, disturb our ancestors;
From human mould we feap our daily bread
The globe around earth's hollow furface shakes,
And is the ceiling of her fleeping fons.
O'er devaftation we blind revels keep;
While bury'd towns fupport the dancer's heel.
The moist of human frame the fun exhales;
Winds fcatter, thro' the mighty void, the dry;
Earth repoffeffes part of what she gave,
And the freed spirit mounts on wings of fire;
Each element partakes our scatter'd spoils;
As nature, wide, our ruins fpread; Man's death
Inhabits all things, but the thought of man.
Norman alone, his breathing buft expires,
His tomb is mortal; empires die. Where, now,
The Roman? Greek? they stalk, an empty name !
Yet few regard them in this useful light;
Tho' half our learning is their epitaph.
When down thy vale, unlock'd by midnight thought
That loves to wander in thy funless realms,
O Death I stretch my view; what visions rise!
What triumphs; toils imperial! arts divine!
In wither'd laurels, glide before my fight!
What lengths of far-fam'd ages, billow'd high
With human agitation, roll along
In unsubstantial images of air!
The melancholy ghofts of dead renown,
Whifp'ring faint echoes of the world's applause,
With penitential afpect, as they pass,
All point at earth, and hifs at human pride,
The wifdom of the wife, and prancings of the great.
But, O LORENZO! far the reft above,
Of ghaftly nature, and enormous fize,
One form affaults my fight, and chills
And shakes my frame. Of one departed world
I fee the mighty fhadow; oozy wreath
And difmal fea-weed crown her*; O'er her ura
Reclin'd, fhe weeps her defolated realms,
And bloated fons; and, weeping, prophecies
*The Deluge referred to,
Another's diffolution, foon, in flames.
But, like CASSANDRA, prophefies in vain ;
In vain, to many; not, I trust, to thee.
For, know'st thou not, or art thou loath to know,
The great decree, the counfel of the skies?
Deluge and conflagration, dreadful pow'rs!
Prime minifters of vengeance! chain'd in caves
Diftinct, apart the giant furies roar;
Apart; or, fuch their horrid rage for ruin,
In mutual conflict would they rife, and wage
Eternal war, till one was quite devour'd.
But not for this, ordain'd their boundless rage:
When Heav'n's inferior inftruments of wrath,
War, famine, pestilence, are found too weak
To fcourge a world for her enormous crimes,
These are let loofe, alternate: Down they rush,
Swift and tempeftuous, from th' Eternal Throne,
With irresistible commiffion arm'd,
The world, in vain corrected, to destroy,
And ease creation of the fhocking scene.
Seeft thou, LORENZO! what depends on man.
The fate of nature, as for man, her birth.
Earth's actors change earth's tranfitory fcenes,
And make creation groan with human guilt.
How muft it groan, in a new deluge whelm'd,
But not of waters? At the deftin'd hour,
By the loud trumpet fummon'd to the charge,
See, all the formidable fons of fire,
Eruptions, Earthquakes, Comets, Lightnings, play
Their various engines; all at once difgorge
Their blazing magazines; and take, by ftorm,
This poor terreftrial citadel of man.
Amazing period! when each mountain-height
Out-burns Vesuvius; rocks eternal pour
Their melted mafs, as rivers once they pour'd;
Stars rush; and final Ruin fiercely drives
Her ploughfhare o'er creation?- While aloft,
More than aftonishment! if more can be!
Far other firmament than e'e was feen,
T
Than e'er was thought by man
Stars animate, that govern those of fire;
Far other sun!- A fun, O how unlike
The babe at BETHLE'M! how unlike the man
That groan'd on CALVARY!Yet He it is;
That man of forrows! O how chang'd! what pomp!
In grandeur terrible, all Heav'n defcends!
And gods, ambitious, triumph in his train.
A fwift archangel, with his golden wing,
As blots and clouds, that darken and difgrace
The fcene divine, fweeps ftars and funs afide.
And now, all drofs remov'd, Heav'n's own pure day,
Full on the confines of our æther, flames:
While (dreadful contraft!) far, how far beneath!
Hell burfting, belches forth her blazing seas,
And ftorms fulphureous; her voracious jaws
Expanding wide, and roaring for her prey.
LORENZO! welcome to this scene; the laft
In Nature's courfe; the firft in Wisdom's thought.
This ftrikes, if aught can ftrike thee; this awakes
The most fupine: this fnatches man from death.
Roufe, roufe, LORENZO! then, and follow me,
Where truth, the moft momentous man can hear,
Loud calls my foul, and ardour wings her flight.
I find my infpiration in my theme;
The grandeur of my fubject is my Mufe.
At midnight, when mankind is wrapt in peace,
And worldly Fancy feeds on golden dreams;
To give more dread to man's most dreadful hour,
At midnight, 'tis prefum'd, this pomp will burft
From tenfold darkness; fudden as the spark
From fmitten fteel; from nitrous grain, the blaze.
Man, ftarting from his couch, fhall fleep no more!
The day is broke, which never more shall close!
Above, around, beneath, amazement all!
Terror and glory join'd in their extremes !
Our GoD in grandeur, and our world on fire!
All Nature ftruggling in the pangs of death!
Doft thou not hear her? doft thou not deplore
Her ftrong convulfions, and her final groan?
Where are we now? Ah me! the ground is gone,
On which we stood, LORENZO! While thou may'st,
Provide more firm fupport, or fink for ever!
Where? how? from whence? Vain hope! it is too late!
Where, where, for fhelter, fhall the guilty fly,
When confternation turns the good man pale?
Great day! for which all other days were made;
For which earth rofe from chaos, man from earth;
And an eternity, the date of gods,
Defcended on poor earth-created man!
Great day of dread, decifion, and despair!
At thought of thee, each fublunary with
Lets go its eager grafp, and drops the world,
And catches at each reed of hope in heav'n.
At thought of thee!-and art thou absent, then?
LORENZO! no; 'tis here; —it is begun ;-
Already is begun the grand affize,
In thee, in all: Deputed Confcience fcales
The dread tribunal, and foreftals our doom;
Foreftalls; and, by foreftalling, proves it sure.
Why on himself fhould man void judgment pafs?
Is idle Nature laughing at her fons ?
Who Conscience fent, her fentence will fupport,
And GOD above affert that GOD in man.
Thrice happy they, that enter now the court
Heav'n opens in their bofoms: But how rare!
Ah me! that magnanimity, how rare!
What hero like the man who ftands himself?
Who dares to meet his naked heart alone?
Who hears, intrepid, the full charge it brings
Refolv'd to filence future murmurs there?
The coward flies; and flying, is undone.
(Art thou a coward? No): The coward flies;
Thinks, but thinks flightly; afks, but fears to know,
Afks, "What is Truth ?" with Pilate; and retires;
Diffolves the court, and mingles with the throng;
Afylum fad, from Reafon, Hope, and Heav'n!
Shall all, but man, look out with ardent eye,
For that great day, which was ordain'd for man?
|