And Æthiopia spreads abroad the hand,
And worships. Her report has travell'd forth Into all lands. From ev'ry clime they come To fee thy beauty and to share thy joy,
O Sion! an assembly such as earth
Saw never, such as Heav'n stoops down to fee.
Thus heav'n-ward all things tend. For all were once
Perfect, and all must be at length reftor'd. So God has greatly purpos'd; who would else In his dishonour'd works himself endure Dishonour, and be wrong'd without redress. Haste, then, and wheel away a shatter'd world, Ye flow-revolving seasons! we would fee (A fight to which our eyes are strangers yet) A world that does not dread and hate his laws, And fuffer for its crime; would learn how fair The creature is that God pronounces good, How pleasant in itself what pleases him.
Here ev'ry drop of honey hides a sting;
Worms wind themselves into our sweetest flow'rs;
And ev'n the joy that haply some poor heart Derives from heav'n, pure as the fountain is, Is fullied in the stream, taking a taint From touch of human lips, at best impure. Oh for a world in principle as chafte As this is gross and selfish! over which Custom and prejudice shall bear no sway, That govern all things here, should'ring aside The meek and modeft truth, and forcing her To feek a refuge from the tongue of strife In nooks obfcure, far from the ways of men:- Where violence shall never lift the sword, Nor cunning justify the proud man's wrong, Leaving the poor no remedy but tears:- Where he that fills an office shall esteem Th' occafion it presents of doing good More than the perquisite:-where law shall speak Seldom, and never but as wisdom prompts And equity; not jealous more to guard A worthless form, than to decide aright:-
Where fashion shall not sanctify abuse,
Nor smooth good-breeding (fupplemental grace) With lean performance ape the work of love!
Come then, and, added to thy many crowns,
Receive yet one, the crown of all the earth, Thou who alone art worthy! It was thine By ancient covenant, ere nature's birth; And thou hast made it thine by purchase since, And overpaid its value with thy blood.
Thy faints proclaim thee king; and in their hearts
Thy title is engraven with a pen
Dipt in the fountain of eternal love.
Thy faints proclaim thee king; and thy delay Gives courage to their foes, who, could they fee The dawn of thy last advent, long-defir'd, Would creep into the bowels of the hills, And flee for safety to the falling rocks.
The very fpirit of the world is tir'd
Of its own taunting question, afk'd so long,
"Where is the promise of your Lord's approach?"
The infidel has shot his bolts away,
Till, his exhausted quiver yielding none,
He gleans the blunted shafts that have recoil'd,
And aims them at the shield of truth again.
The veil is rent, rent too by priestly hands, That hides divinity from mortal eyes; And all the mysteries to faith propos'd, Infulted and traduc'd, are caft afide, As uselefs, to the moles and to the bats. They now are deem'd the faithful, and are prais'd, Who, constant only in rejecting thee, Deny thy Godhead with a martyr's zeal, And quit their office for their error's fake. Blind, and in love with darkness! yet ev'n thefe Worthy, compar'd with sycophants, who knee Thy name adoring, and then preach thee man! So fares thy church. But how thy church may fare The world takes little thought. Who will may preach, And what they will. All pastors are alike
To wand'ring sheep, refolv'd to follow none. Two gods divide them all-Pleasure and Gain: For these they live, they sacrifice to these, And in their service wage perpetual war With confcience and with thee. Luft in their hearts, And mischief in their hands, they roam the earth To prey upon each other; stubborn, fierce, High-minded, foaming out their own disgrace. Thy prophets speak of such; and, noting down The features of the last degen'rate times, Exhibit ev'ry lineament of thefe.
Come then, and, added to thy many crowns, Receive yet one, as radiant as the reft, Due to thy last and most effectual work, Thy word fulfill'd, the conquest of a world!
He is the happy man, whose life ev'n now Shows fomewhat of that happier life to come; Who, doom'd to an obfcure but tranquil state, Is pleas'd with it, and, were he free to choose,
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