A fudden defart spreads o'er realms defac'd,
And lays one half of the creation waste?

Thou know't Me not; Thy blindness cannot see
How vaft a distance parts thy God from Thee.
Canft Thou in whirlwinds mount aloft? Canft Thou
In clouds and darkness wrap thy awful brow?'
And, when day triumphs in meridian light,

Put forth thy hand, and fhade the world with night?
Who launch'd the clouds in air, and bid them roll
Sufpended feas aloft, from pole to pole?
Who can refresh the burning fandy plain,
And quench the fummer with a waste of rain?
Who, in rough defarts, far from human toil,
Made rocks bring forth, and defolation smile?
There blooms the rofe, where human face ne'er shone,
And spreads its beauties to the fun alone.

To check the flow'r, who lifts his hand on high,
And shuts the fluices of th' exhausted sky,

When earth no longer mourns her gaping veins,
Her naked mountains, and her ruffet plains;
But, new in life, a chearful profpect yields
Of thining rivers, and of verdant fields;
When groves and forests lavish all their bloom,
And earth and heav'n are fill'd with rich perfume?
Haft Thou e'er fcal'd my wintry skies, and feen
Of hail and fnows my northern magazine ?

These the dread treasures of mine

anger are,

My funds of vengeance for the day of war,

When clouds rain death, and storms, at my command,.
Rage through the world, or waste a guilty land.
Who taught the rapid winds to fly fo faft,

Or fhakes the centre with his eastern blast?
Who from the fkies can a whole deluge pour?
Who ftrikes through nature with the folemn roar
Of dreadful thunder, points it where to fall,
And in fierce lightning wraps the flying ball?
Not he who trembles at the darted fires,
Falls at the found, and in the flash expires.

Who

Who drew the comet out to fuch a fize,

And pour'd his flaming train o'er half the skies?
Did Thy refentment hang him out? Does he
Glare on the nations, and denounce, from Thee?

Who on low earth can moderate the rein,
That guides the Stars along th' ethereal plain?
Appoint their feafons, and direct their courfe,
Their luftre brighten, and fupply their force?
Canft Thou the fkies benevolence reítrain,
And cause the Pleiades to shine in vain?
Or, when Orion fparkles from his fphere,
Thaw the cold season, and unbind the year?
Bid Mazzaroth his deftin'd station know,
And teach the bright Arcturus where to glow ?
Mine is the night, with all her ftars; I pour
Myriads, and myriads I referve in store.

Doft Thou pronounce where day-light fhall be born,
And draw the purple curtain of the morn;
Awake the fun, and bid him come away,
And glad thy world with his obfequious ray?
Haft Thou, inthron'd in flaming glory, driv'n
Triumphant round the spacious ring of heav'n?
That pomp of light, what hand fo far difplays,
That diftant earth lies basking in the blaze?

Who did the foul with her rich pow'rs invest, And light up reason in the human breast? To fhine, with fresh increase of luftre, bright, When ftars and fun are fet in endless night? To thefe my various queftions make reply. Th' Almighty fpoke; and, speaking, thook the fky. What then, Chaldæan Sire, was thy furprize! Thus Thou, with trembling heart, and downcaft eyes: "Once and again, which I in groans deplore, "My tongue has err'd; but shall prefume no more. "My voice is in eternal filence bound, “And all my foul falls proitrate to the ground." He ceas'd: When, lo! again th' Almighty fpoke; The fame dread voice from the black whirlwind broke.

Can

Can that arm meafure with an arm divine?
And canft thou thunder with a voice like Mine?
Or in the hollow of thy hand contain

The bulk of waters, the wide-fpreading main,
When, mad with tempefts, all the billows rife
In all their rage, and dafh the distant skies?

Come forth, in beauty's excellence array'd;
And be the grandeur of thy pow'r difplay'd;
Put on omnipotence, and, frowning, make
The fpacious round of the creation shake;
Dispatch thy vengeance, bid it overthrow
Triumphant vice, lay lofty tyrants low,

And crumble them to duft. When This is done,
I grant thy fafety lodg'd in Thee alone;
Of Thee Thou art, and may'st undaunted stand
Behind the buckler of thine own right hand.

Fond man! the vifion of a moment made!
Dream of a dream! and fhadow of a fhade!
What worlds haft Thou produc'd, what creatures
fram'd;

What infects cherish'd, that thy God is blam'd?` When + pain'd with hunger, the wild Raven's brood Loud calls on God, importunate for food,

Who hears their cry, who grants their hoarfe request, And ftills the clamour of the craving neft?

Who

† Another argument that Mofes was the author, is, that most of the creatures here mentioned are Egyptian. The reafon given why the raven is particularly mentioned as an object of the care of Providence, is, because by her clamorous and importunate voice, she particularly feems always calling upon it;, thence xopárra axopak, Elian. 1. ii. c. 48. is to afk earneftly. And fince there were ravens on the banks of the Nile more clamorous than the rest of that fpecies, thofe probably are meant in that place.

Who in the ftupid Ostrich † has fubdu'd A parent's care, and fond inquietude?

While far fhe flies, her fcatter'd eggs are found,
Without an owner, on the fandy ground;
Caft out on fortune, they at mercy lie,
And borrow life from an indulgent sky:
Adopted by the fun, in blaze of day,
They ripen under his prolific ray.
Unmindful the, that fome unhappy tread
May cruth her young in their neglected bed.
What time the fkims along the field with speed,
She fcorns the rider, and pursuing steed.

How

There are many inftances of this bird's ftupidity: Let two fuffice. First, it covers its head in the reeds, and thinks itself all out of fight,

Stat lumine claufo Ridendum revoluta caput, creditque latere Quæ non ipfa videt

Claud.

Secondly, They that go in pursuit of them, draw the fkin of an Ostrich's neck on one hand, which proves a fufficient lure to take them, with the other.

They have fo little brain, that Heliogabalus had fix hundred heads for his fupper.

Here we may obfèrve, that our judicious as well as fublime author, juft touches the great points of di ftinction in each creature, and then hastens to another. A defcription is exact when you cannot add, but what is common to another thing; nor withdraw, but fomething peculiarly belonging to the thing defcribed. A likeness is loft in too much description, as a meaning often in too much illuftration.

Here is marked another peculiar quality of this creature, which neither flies nor runs directly, but has a motion compofed of both, and ufing its wings as fails, makes great speed.

How rich the Peacock *! what bright glories run From plume to plume, and vary in the fun? He proudly spreads them to the golden ray, Gives all his colours, and adorns the day; With confcious ftate the fpacious round difplays, And flowly moves amid the waving blaze.

Who taught the Hawk to find, in feasons wife, Perpetual fummer, and a change of skies?

When clouds deform the year, the mounts the wind, Shoots to the south, nor fears the storm behind; The fun returning, fhe returns agen,

Lives in his beams, and leaves ill days to men.

Tho' ftrong the Hawk †, tho' practis'd well to fly, An Eagle drops her in a lower sky;

Vafta velut Libya venantum vocibus ales
Cum premitur, calidas curfu tranfmittit arenas,
Inque modum veli finuatis flamine pennis
Pulverulenta volat-
Claud. in Eutr.

Xenophon fays, Cyrus had horses that could overtake the goat and the wild afs; but none that could reach this creature. A thousand golden ducats, or a hundred camels, was the stated price of a horse that could equal their speed.

* Though this bird is but just mentioned in my author, I could not forbear going a little farther, and fpreading those beautiful plumes (which are there shut up) in half a dozen lines. The circumstance I have marked of his opening his plumes to the fun is true; Expandit colores adverfo maxime fole, quia fic fulgentius radiant. Plin. l. x. c. 20.

Thayanus (de Re Accip.) mentions a hawk that flew from Paris to London in a night.

And the Egyptians, in regard to its fwiftnefs, made. it their fymbol for the wind; for which reason we may fuppofe the hawk, as well as the crow above, to have been a bird of note in Egypt.

An