EAV'N gives the needful, but neglected, Call.
What Day, what Hour, but knocks at human
Hearts,
To wake the Soul to Senfe of future Scenes ?
Deaths ftand, like Mercurys, in ev'ry Way;
And kindly point us to our Journey's End.
POPE, who couldft make Immortals! art Thou dead?
I give thee Joy: Nor will I take my Leave;
So foon to follow. Man but dives to Death;
Dives from the Sun, in fairer Day to rife;
The Grave, his fubterranean Road to Blifs.
Yes, infinite Indulgence plann'd it fo;
Thro' various Parts our glorious Story runs;
Time gives the Preface, endless Age unrolls
The Volume (ne'er unroll'd!) of human Fate,
This, Earth and Skies * already havé proclaim'd. The World's a Prophecy of Worlds to come;
And who, what GOD foretels (who speaks in Things,
Still louder than in Words) fhall dare deny ?
If Nature's Arguments appear too weak,
Turn a new Leaf, and stronger read in Man.
If Man fleeps on, untaught by what he fees,
Can he prove Infidel to what he feels?
He, whose blind Thought Futurity denies,
Unconscious bears, BELLEROPHON! like thee,
His own Indictment; he condemns himself;
Who reads his Bofom, reads immortal Life;
Or, Nature, there, impofing on her Sons,
Has written Fables; Man was made a Lye.
Why Difcontent for ever harbour'd there?
Incurable Confumption of our Peace!
Refolve me, why, the Cottager, and King,
He whom Sea-fever'd Realms obey, and he
Who fteals his whole Dominion from the Wafte,
Repelling Winter Blafts with Mud and Straw,
Difquieted alike, draw Sigh for Sigh,
In Fate fo diftant, in Complaint fo near?
Js it, that Things Terreftrial can't content?
Deep in rich Pafture, will thy Flocks complain?
Not fo; but to their Master is deny'd
'To share their sweet Serene. Man, ill at Eafe,
In this, not his own Place, this foreign Field,
Where Nature fodders him with other Food,
Than was ordain'd his Cravings to fuffice,
Poor in Abundance, famish'd at a Feast,
Sighs on for fomething more, when most enjoy'd.
Is Heav'n then kinder to thy Flocks, than Thee?
Not fo; thy Pafture richer, but remote ;
In part, remote; for that remoter Part
Man bleats from Infint, tho', perhaps, debauch'd
By Senfe, his Reafon fleeps, nor dreams the Caufe,
The Caufe how obvious, when his Reafon wakes!
His Grief is but his Grandeur in Disguise;
And Difcontent is Immortality.
Shall Sons of Ether, fhall the Blood of Heaven,
Set up their Hopes on Earth, and stable here,
With brutal Acquiefcence in the Mire?
LORENZO no; they fhall be nobly pain'd;
The glorious Foreigners, diftreft, shall figh
On Thrones; and Thou congratulate the Sigh:
Man's Mifery declares him born for Bliss;
His anxious Heart afferts the Truth I fing,
And gives the Sceptic in his Head the Lye.
Our Heads, our Hearts, our Paffions, and our Powers, Speak the fame Language; call us to the Skies; Unripen'd Thefe in this inclement Clime, Scarce rife above Conjecture, and Mistake; And for this Land of Trifles Thofe too strong Tumultuous rife, and tempeft human Life; What Prize on Earth can pay us for the Storm? Meet Objects for our Paions Heav'n ordain'd, Objects that challenge all their Fire, and leave No Fault, but in Defect: Bleft Heav'n! avert A bounded Ardor for unbounded Bliss; O for a Blifs 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, Tranfplanted from this fublunary Bed, Shall flourish fair, and put forth all their Bloom.
Reafon progreffive, Inftinct is complete ;
Swift Infine leaps; flow Reafon feebly climbs.
Brutes foon 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 co eval with the Sun,
The Patriarch-Pupil would be learning still;
Yet, dying, leave his Leffon half-unlearnt.
Men perifh in Advance, as if the Sun
Should fet ere Noon, in Eastern Oceans drown'd;
If fit, with Dim, Illuftrious to compare,
The Sun's Meridian, with the Soul of Man.
To Man, why, Stepdame Nature! so severe ?
Why thrown afide thy Mafter-piece half-wrought,
While meaner Efforts thy laft Hand enjoy?
Or, if abortively poor Man muft die,
Nor reach, what reach he might, why die in Dread?
Why curft with Forefight? Wife to Misery?
Why of his proud Prerogative the Prey?
Why lefs pre-eminent in Rank, than Pain?
His Immortality alone can tell;
Full ample Fund to balance all amifs,
And turn the Scale in Favour of the Juft!
His Immortality alone can folve
That darkeft of Enigmas, human Hope;
Of all the darkest, if at Death we die.
Hope, eager Hope, th'Affaffin of our Joy,
All prefent Bleffings treading under-foot,
Is fcarce a milder Tyrant than Despair.
With no past Toils content, ftill planning new,
Hope turns us o'er to Death alone for Ease.
Poffeffion, why, more tasteless than Pursuit?
Why is a Wish far dearer than a Crown?
That With accomplish'd, why, the Grave of Blifs?
Because, in the great Future bury'd deep,
Beyond our Plans of Empire, and Renown,
Lies all that Man with Ardor should pursue;
And He who made him, bent him to the Right.
Man's Heart th'ALMIGHTY to the Future fets, By fecret, and inviolable Springs;
And makes his Hope his fublunary Joy.
Man's Heart eats all Things, and is hungry ftill;
"More, more!" the Glutton cries: For fomething New
So rages Appetite, if Man can't Mount,
He will Defcend. He ftarves on the Poffeft.
Hence, the World's Mafter, 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 confulted Birds; LORENZO! thou
With more Succefs, the Flight of Hope furvey;
Of restless Hope, for ever on the Wing.
High-perch'd o'er ev'ry Thought that Falcon fits,
To fly at all that rises in her Sight;
And, never ftooping, but to mount again
Next Moment, the betrays her Aim's Mistake,
And owns her Quarry lodg'd beyond the Grave.
There should it fail us (It muft fail us there,
If Being fails), more mournful Riddles rife,
And Virtue vies with Hope in Mystery.
Why Virtue? Where its Praise, its Being, fled?
Virtue is true Self-intereft purfu'd:
What true Self-intereft of quite-mortal Man?
To close with all that makes him Happy here.
If Vice (as fometimes) is our Friend on Earth,
Then Vice is Virtue; 'tis our fov'reign Good.
In Self-applaufe is Virtue's golden Prize;
No Self-applaufe attends it on thy Scheme:
Whence Self-applaufe? From Confcience of the Right.
And what is Right, but Means of Happiness ?
No Means of Happiness when Virtue yields;
That Bafis failing, falls the Building too,
And lays in Ruins ev'ry virtuous Joy.
The rigid Guardian of a blameless Heart,
So long rever'd, fo long reputed wife,
Is weak; with rank Knight-errantries o'er-run.
Why beats thy Bofom with illuftrious Dreams
Of Self-expofure, laudable, and great?
Of gallant Enterprize, and glorious Death?
Die for thy Country ?-Thou Romantic Fool!
Seize, feize the Plank thyfelf, and let her fink:
Thy Country! what to Thee?-The God-head; what?
(I fpeak with Awe!) tho' He fhould bid thee bleed ?
If, with thy Blood, thy final Hope is spilt,
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