His steps the youth pursues: the country lay
Perplexed with roads; a servant showed the way;
A river crossed the path; the passage o'er
Was nice to find; the servant trod before;
Long arms of oaks an open bridge supplied,
And deep the waves beneath them bending glide.
The youth, who seemed to watch a time to sin,
Approached the careless guide, and thrust him in ;
Plunging he falls, and rising, lifts his head,
Then flashing turns, and sinks among the dead.
While sparkling rage inflames the father's eyes,
He burst the bands of fear, and madly cries:
"Detested wretch !"--but scarce his speech began,
When the strange partner seemed no longer man!
His youthful face grew more serenely sweet;
His robe turned white, and flowed upon his feet;
Fair rounds of radiant points invest his hair;
Celestial odours breathe through purpled air;
And wings, whose colours glittered on the day,
Wide at his back their gradual plumes display.
The form ethereal bursts upon his sight,
And moves in all the majesty of light.
Though loud at first the pilgrim's passion grew,
Sudden he gazed, and wist not what to do;
Surprise, in secret chains, his word suspends,
And in a calm, his settling temper ends,
But silence here the beauteous angel broke—
The voice of Music ravished as he spoke :
66 Thy prayer, thy praise, thy life to vice unknown,
In sweet memorial rise before the throne:
These charms success in our bright region find,
And force an angel down to calm thy mind;
For this commissioned, I forsook the sky :
Nay, cease to kneel-thy fellow-servant I.
Then know the truth of government divine,
And let these scruples be no longer thine.
The Maker justly claims that world he made;
In this the right of Providence is laid;
Its sacred majesty through all depends
On using second means to work his ends :
'Tis thus, withdrawn in state from human eye,
The power exerts his attributes on high;
Your action uses, nor controls your will,
Eternity! thou pleasing, dreadful thought!
Through what variety of untried being,
Through what new scenes and changes must we pass?
The wide, th' unbounded prospect lies before me ;
But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it.
Here will I hold. If there's a power above us--
And that there is, all nature cries aloud
Through all her works- he must delight in virtue ;
And that which he delights in must be happy.
But when? or where? This world was made for Cæsar.
I'm weary of conjectures. This must end them.
[Laying his hand on his sword.
Thus am I doubly armed: my death and life,
My bane and antidote, are both before me :
This in a moment brings me to an end;
But this informs me I shall never die.
The soul, secured in her existence, smiles
At the drawn dagger, and defies its point.
The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years;
But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth,
Unhurt amidst the wars of elements,
The wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds.
What means this heaviness that hangs upon me?
This lethargy that creeps through all my senses?
Nature oppressed, and harassed out with care,
Sinks down to rest. This once I'll favour her,
That my awakened soul may take her flight,
Renewed in all her strength, and fresh with life,
An offering fit for heaven. Let guilt or fear
Disturb man's rest: Cato knows neither of them;
Indifferent in his choice to sleep or die.
THIS distinguished divine and poet was born at Southampton, on 17th July 1674. In early life he showed such talents, that a subscription was proposed to send him to the University; but being a Dissenter, and inclining to remain one, he went to an academy taught by the Rev. Thomas Rowe, where he remained till he was twenty. During this time he had been "a maker of verses," especially in Latin. After this he obtained the situation of tutor in the family of Sir John Hartopp, at Stoke-Newington, where he remained for four years, when he was, in his twenty-fourth
year, chosen assistant-pastor to Dr Chassery
Bad health in a short time incapacitated.
pastoral duties, and ar avósant war z
friend, Sir Thomas Atmey was so k
apartments in his house: he remove
was the cherished inmate of Abner Hous
posed his "Logic," Improvement or
and sacred songs which enrich every c
through life was never quite int ma
officiated occasionally. He dieca
at the age of seventy-five.
EARTH AND ELLVIT
HAST thou not seen, impatient pr
Hast thou not read the semi truit
That gray experience write for T
On every mortar
Pleasure must be dashed wH: I
And yet, with neediest nare.
The thirsty boy repeats the taste.
Nor hearkens to despair, but tries the low.agi.
The rills of pleasure never rui. sincere ·
Earth has no umplute spring.
From the cursed soil some dangerous taim the
So roses grow on thorns, and noney Weat: & BULLS_
In vain we seek a heaven below the s
The world has false but flattering enarm-
Its distant joys show big in our esteen..
But lessen still as they draw near the eye.
In our embrace the visions die :
And when we grasp the airy forms.
We lose the pleasing arean..
Earth, with her scenes of gay uelgut,
Is but a landscape rudely drawL.
With glaring colours, and fast lign:
Distance commends it to the sight,
For fools to gaze upon.
But bring the nauseous daubing nigl..
Coarse and confused the hideous figure lie,
Dissolve the pleasure, and offend: tue eye.
Look up, my soul, pant tow'rd the eternal hille
Those heavens are fairer than they seem;
There pleasures all sincere glide on in crystal rill
There not a dreg of guilt defiles,
And bids the doubting sons of men be still.
What strange events can strike with more surprise,
Than those which lately struck thy wondering eyes?
Yet, taught by these, confess the Almighty just,
And, where you can't unriddle, learn to trust.
The great vain man, who fared on costly food,
Whose life was too luxurious to be good;
Who made his ivory stands with goblets shine,
And forced his guests to morning-draughts of wine;
Has, with the cup, the graceless custom lost,
And still he welcomes, but with less of cost.
The mean suspicious wretch, whose bolted door
Ne'er moved in pity to the wandering poor;
With him I left the cup, to teach his mind
That Heaven can bless, if mortals will be kind.
Conscious of wanting worth, he views the bowl,
And feels compassion touch his grateful soul.
Thus artists melt the sullen ore of lead,
With heaping coals of fire upon its head;
In the kind warmth the metal learns to glow,
And, loose from dross, the silver runs below.
Long had our pious friend in virtue trod,
But now the child half-weaned his heart from God--
Child of his age-for him he lived in pain,
And measured back his steps to earth again.
To what excesses had his dotage run;
But God, to save the father, took the son.
To all but thee, in fits he seemed to go,
And 'twas my ministry to deal the blow.
The poor fond parent, humbled in the dust,
Now owns in tears the punishment was just.
But how had all his fortunes felt a wrack,
Had that false servant sped in safety back?
This night his treasured heaps he meant to steal,
And what a fund of charity would fail!
Thus Heaven instructs thy mind: this trial o'er,
Depart in peace, resign, and sin no more."
On sounding pinions here the youth withdrew,
The sage stood wondering as the seraph flew;
Thus looked Elisha, when, to mount on high,
His master took the chariot of the sky;
The fiery pomp ascending left the view;
The prophet gazed, and wished to follow too.
The bending hermit here a prayer begun :
"Lord, as in heaven, on earth thy will be done."
Then, gladly turning, sought his ancient place,
And passed a life of piety and peace.
NIGHT-PIECE ON DEATH.
By the blue taper's trembling light,
No more I waste the wakeful night,
Intent with endless view to pore
The schoolmen and the sages o'er:
Their books from wisdom widely stray,
Or point at best the longest way.
I'll seek a readier path, and go
Where wisdom's surely taught below.
How deep yon azure dyes the sky!
Where orbs of gold unnumbered lie,
While through their ranks in silver pride
The nether crescent seems to glide.
The slumbering breeze forgets to breathe,
The lake is smooth and clear beneath,
Where once again the spangled show
Descends to meet our eyes below.
The grounds, which on the right aspire,
In dimness from the view retire:
The left presents a place of graves,
Whose wall the silent water laves.
That steeple guides thy doubtful sight
Among the livid gleams of night.
There pass, with melancholy state,
By all the solemn heaps of fate,
And think, as softly sad you tread
Above the venerable dead,
"Time was, like thee they life possest,
And time shall be, that thou shalt rest.”
Those, with bending osier bound,
That nameless heave the crumbled ground,
Quick to the glancing thought disclose,
Where toil and poverty repose.
The flat, smooth stones that bear a name,
The chisel's slender help to fame,
(Which ere our set of friends decay,
Their frequent steps may wear away ;)
A middle race of mortals own,
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