How judge of revelation's force divine,
If truth unerring gave not the defign;
Where, as in nature's fair according plan,
All smiles benevolent and good to man.
Plac'd in this narrow clouded spot below,
Darkly we see around, and darkly know!
Religion lends the falutary beam,
That guides our reason thro' the dubious gleam;
Till founds the hour!-when he who rules the skies,
Shall bid the curtain of omniscience rife!
Shall diffipate the mists that veil our fight,
And show his creatures-all his ways are right!
Then, when aftonish'd nature feels its fate,
And fetter'd time fhall know its latest date!
When earth fhall in the mighty blaze expire,
Heaven melt with heat, and worlds diffolve in fire!
The univerfal fyftem fhrink away,
And ceafing orbs confefs th' almighty sway:
Immortal he, amidst the wreck secure,
Shall fit exalted, permanently pure!
As in the facred bush, shall shine the fame,
And from the ruin raise a fairer frame.
Far hence, ye vifionary charming maids, Ye fancied nymphs that haunt the Grecian fhades; Your birth, who from conceiving fiction drew,
Your felves producing phantoms as untrue;
But come, fuperior mufe! divinely bright,
Daughter of heaven, whofe offspring ftill are light;
O condefcend, celeftial facred gueft,.
To purge my fight, and confecrate my breaft;
While I presume omnipotence to trace,
And fing that power, who peopled boundless space.
Thou prefent wert, when forth th' Almighty rode,
While chaos trembled at the voice of God:
Thou faw'ft, when o'er th' immense his line he drew,
When nothing from his word existence knew:
His word, that wak'd to life the vast profound,
While conscious light was kindled at the found:
Creation fair furpriz'd th' angelic eyes,
And fovereign wisdom faw that all was wife:
Him, fole almighty nature's book displays,
Diftinct the page, and legible the rays:
Let the wild fceptic his attention throw
To the broad horizon, or earth below;
He finds thy foft impreffions touch his breaft,
He feels the God,-and owns him unconfefs'd:
Should the ftray pilgrim, tir'd of fands and skies,
In Lybia's wafte behold a palace rise,
Would he believe the charm from atoms wrought?
Go, atheift, hence, and mend thy jufter thought.
What hand, almighty architect! but thine,
Could give the model of this vaft defign?
What hand but thine adjust th' amazing whole?
And bid confenting fyftems beauteous roll:
What hand but thine fupply the folar light?
For ever wafting, yet for ever bright:
What hand but thine the azure convex spread?
What hand but thine trace out the ocean's bed?
To the vast main the fandy barrier throw,
And with that feeble curb reftrain the foe?
What hand but thine the wintry flood afswage,
Or ftop the tempeft in its wildeft rage?
Thee infinite! what finite can explore?
Imagination finks beneath thy power;
Thee could the ableft of thy creatures know,
Loft were thy unity, for he were Thou;
Yet present to all sense thy power remains,
Reveal'd in nature, nature's author reigns:
In vain would error from conviction fly,
Thou every where art present to the eye:
The fenfe how ftupid, and the fight how blind,
That fails this universal truth to find?
Go!-all the fightlefs realms of space survey,
Returning, trace the planetary way;
The fun, that in his central glory fhines,
While every planet round his orb inclines;
Then at our intermediate globe repose,
And view yon lunar fatellite that glows!
Or caft along the azure vault thy eye,
When golden day enlightens all the sky;
Around behold earth's variegated scene,
The mingling profpects, and the flowery green;
The mountain's brow, the long extended wood,
Or the rude rock that threatens o'er the flood;
And say, are these the wild effects of chance?
Oh strange effect of reasoning ignorance!
Nor power alone confefs'd in grandeur lies,
The glittering planet, or the painted skies;
Equal, the elephant's or emmet's dress,
The wisdom of omnipotence confess;
Equal, the cumbrous whale's enormous mass,
With the small infect in the crouded grass;
The mite that gambols in its acid fea,
In shape a porpus, tho' a speck to thee!
Even the blue down the purple plum furrounds,
A living world, thy failing fight confounds!
To him a peopled habitation shows,
Where millions tafte the bounty God bestows!
Great lord of life, whofe all-controuling might
'Thro' wide creation beams divinely bright;
Nor only does thy power in forming fhine,
But to annihilate, dread king! is thine.
Sho aft thou withdraw thy ftill-fupporting hand,
How languid nature would astonish'd stand!
Thy frown night's ancient empire would restore,
And raise a blank-where systems smil'd before.
See in corruption, all-furprizing state,
How struggling life eludes the stroke of fate;
Shock'd at the scene, tho' sense averts its eye,
Nor ftops the wonderous process to descry;
Yet jufter thought the mystic change pursues,
And with delight almighty wisdom views;
The brute, the vegetable world furveys,
Sees life fubfifting even from life's decays:
Mark there, self-taught, the penfile reptile come,
Spin his thin fhroud, and living build his tomb !
With conscious care his former pleasures leave,
And dress him for the business of the grave:
Thence, pafs'd the fhort-liv'd change, renew'd he
fprings,
Admires the skies, and tries his painted wings :
With airy flight the infect roves abroad,
And scorns, the meaner earth he lately trod.
Thee, potent, let deliver'd Ifrael praise,
And to thy name their grateful homage raise:
Thee, potent God! let Egypt's land declare,
"Which felt thy juftice, awfully severe :
How did thy frown benight the fhadow'd land?
Nature revers'd, how own thy high command?
When jarring elements their use forgot,
And the fun felt thy overcafting blot :
When earth produc'd the peftilential brood,
And the foul ftream was crimson'd into blood:
How deep the horrors of that awful night!
How ftrong the terror, and how wild the fright!
When o'er the land thy fword vindictive past,
And men and infants breath'd at once their last!
How did thy arm thy favour'd tribes convey,
Thy light, conducting, point th' amazing way!
Obedient ocean to their march divide,
The watery wall diftinct on either fide;
While thro' the deep the long proceffion led,
And faw the wonders of the oozy bed!
Nor long they march'd, till blackening in the rear,
The vengeful tyrant and his hoft appear;
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