Another ocean calls, a nobler port;
I am thy pilot, I thy prosperous gale.
Gainful thy voyage through yon azure main;
Main, without tempest, pirate, rock, or shore;
And whence thou may'st import eternal wealth;
And leave to beggar'd minds the pearl and gold.
Thy travels dost thou boast o'er foreign realms?
Thou stranger to the world! thy tour begin;
Thy tour through Nature's universal orb.
Nature delineates her whole chart at large,
On soaring souls, that sail among the spheres;
And man how purblind, if unknown the whole!
Who circles spacious Earth, then travels here,
Shall own, he never was from home before!
Come, my Prometheus,* from thy pointed rock
Of false ambition if unchain'd, we'll mount;
We'll, innocently, steal celestial fire,
And kindle our devotion at the stars;
A theft, that shall not chain, but set thee free.
Above our atmosphere's intestine wars,
Rain's fountain-head, the magazine of hail;
Above the northern nests of feather'd snows,
The brew of thunders, and the flaming forge
That forms the crooked lightning; above the caves
Where infant tempests wait their growing wings,
And tune their tender voices to that roar,
Which soon, perhaps, shall shake a guilty world;
Above misconstru'd omens of the sky,
Far-travel'd comets' calculated blaze;
Elance thy thought, and think of more than man.
Thy soul, till now, contracted, wither'd, shrunk,
Blighted by blasts of Earth's unwholesome air,
Will blossom here; spread all her faculties
To these bright ardors; every power unfold,
And rise into sublimities of thought.
Stars teach, as well as shine. At Nature's birth,
Thus their commission ran-" Be kind to man."
Where art thou, poor benighted traveller?
The stars will light thee, though the Moon should fail
Where art thou, more benighted! more astray!
'n ways immoral? The stars call thee back;
And, if obey'd their counsel, set thee right.
This prospect vast, what is it?-Weigh'd aright,
Tis Nature's system of divinity,
And every student of the night inspires.
"Tis elder Scripture, writ by God's own hand:
Scripture authentic! uncorrupt by man.
Lorenzo! with my radius (the rich gift
Of thought nocturnal!) I'll point out to thee
ts various lessons; some that may surprise
An un-adept in mysteries of night;
Little, perhaps, expected in her school,
Nor thought to grow on planet, or on star.
Bulls, lions, scorpions, monsters, here we feign;
Ourselves more monstrous, not to see what here
Exists indeed;-a lecture to mankind.
What read we here?-Th' existence of a God?
Yes; and of other beings, man above;
Natives of ether! Sons of higher climes!
And, what may move Lorenzo's wonder more,
Eternity is written in the skies.
And whose eternity?-Lorenzo! thine;
Mankind's eternity. Nor faith alone,
Those tyrants I for thee so lately* fought,
Afford their harass'd slaves but slender rest.
Thou, to whom midnight is immoral noon,
And the Sun's noontide blaze, prime dawn of day,
Not by thy climate, but capricious crime,
Commencing one of our Antipodes!
In thy nocturnal rove one moment halt,
'Twixt stage and stage, of riot, and cabal;
And lift thine eye (if bold an eye to lift,
If bold to meet the face of injur'd Heaven)
To yonder stars: for other ends they shine,
Than to light revellers from shame to shame,
And, thus, be made accomplices in guilt.
Why from yon arch, that infinite of space,
With infinite of lucid orbs replete,
Which set the living firmament on fire,
At the first glance, in such an overwhelm
Of wonderful, on man's astonish'd sight,
Rushes Omnipotence?-To curb our pride;
Our reason rouse, and lead it to that power,
Whose love lets down these silver chains of light,
To draw up man's ambition to himself,
And bind our chaste affections to his throne.
Thus the three virtues, least alive on Earth,
And welcom'd on Heaven's coast with most ap-
An humble, pure, and heavenly-minded heart,
Are here inspir'd:-And canst thou gaze too long
Nor stands thy wrath, depriv'd of its reproof,
Or un-upbraided by this radiant choir.
The planets of each system represent
Kind neighbors; mutual amity prevails;
Sweet interchange of rays, receiv'd, return'd;
Enlightening, and enlighten'd! All, at once
Attracting, and attracted! Patriot-like,
None sins against the welfare of the whole;
But their reciprocal, unselfish aid,
Affords an emblem of millennial love.
Nothing in Nature, much less conscious being,
Was e'er created solely for itself:
Thus man his sovereign duty learns in this
Material picture of benevolence.
And know, of all our supercilious race,
Thou most inflammable! thou wasp of men!
Man's angry heart, inspected, would be found
As rightly set, as are the starry spheres;
"Tis Nature's structure, broke by stubborn will,
Breeds all that un-celestial discord there.
Wilt thou not feel the bias Nature gave?
Canst thou descend from converse with the skies,
And seize thy brother's throat?-For what-a cloȧ,
An inch of earth? The planets cry, " Forbear!"
They chase our double darkness; Nature's gloom,
And (kinder still!) our intellectual night.
And see, Day's amiable sister sends
Her invitation, in the softest rays
Of mitigated lustre; courts thy sight,
Which suffers from her tyrant-brother's blaze.
Night grants thee the full freedom of the skies,
Nor rudely reprimands thy lifted eye;
With gain, and joy, she bribes thee to be wise.
Night opes the noblest scenes, and sheds an awe,
Which gives those venerable scenes full weight,
Virtue grows here; here springs the sovereign cure And deep reception, in th' entender'd heart;
Of almost every vice; but chiefly thine;
Wrath, pride, ambition, and impure desire.
Lorenzo! thou canst wake at midnight too,
Though not on morals bent: ambition, pleasure!
While light peeps through the darkness, like a spy
And darkness shows its grandeur by the light.
Nor is the profit greater than the joy,
If human hearts at glorious objects glow, And admiration can inspire delight.
What speak I more, than I, this moment, feel?
With pleasing stupor first the soul is struck,
(Stupor ordain'd to make her truly wise!)
Then into transport starting from her trance,
With love, and admiration, how she glows!
This gorgeous apparatus! this display!
This ostentation of creative power!
This theatre-what eye can take it in?
By what divine enchantment was it rais'd,
For minds of the first magnitude to launch
In endless speculation, and adore?
One sun by day, by night ten thousand shine:
And light us deep into the Deity;
How boundless in magnificence and might!
O what a confluence of ethereal fires,
From urns unnumber'd, down the steep of Heaven,
Streams to a point, and centres in my sight!
Nor tarries there; I feel it at my heart.
My heart, at once. it humbles, and exalts;
Lays it in dust, and calls it to the skies.
Who sees it unexalted? or unaw'd?
Who sees it, and can stop at what is seen?
Material offspring of Omnipotence!
Inanimate, all-animating birth!
Work worthy him who made it! worthy praise!
All praise! praise more than human! nor denied
Thy praise divine!-But though man, drown'd in
sleep,
Withholds his homage, not alone I wake;
Bright legions swarm unseen, and sing, unheard
By mortal ear, the glorious Architect,
In this his universal temple hung
With lustres, with innumerable lights,
That shed religion on the soul: at once,
The temple, and the preacher! O how loud
It calls devotion! genuine growth of night!
Devotion! daughter of astronomy!
An undevout astronomer is mad.
True, all things speak a God; but in the small,
Men trace out him; in great, he seizes man;
Seizes, and elevates, and wraps, and fills
With new inquiries, 'mid associates new.
Tell me, ye stars! ye planets! tell me, all
Ye starr'd, and planeted, inhabitants! What is it?
What are these sons of wonder? Say, proud arch,
(Within whose azure palaces they dwell,)
Built with divine ambition! in disdain
Of limit built! built in the taste of Heaven!
Vast concave! ample dome! wast thou design'd
A meet apartment for the Deity ?—
Not so; that thought alone thy state impairs,
Thy lofty sinks, and shallows thy profound,
And straitens thy diffusive; dwarfs the whole,
And makes an universe an orrery.
But when I drop mine eye, and look on man,
Thy right regain'd, thy grandeur is restor'd,
O Nature! wide flies off the expanding round.
As when whole magazines, at once, are fir'd,
The smitten air is hollow'd by the blow;
The vast displosion dissipates the clouds;
Shock'd ether's billows dash the distant skies;
Thus (but far more) th' expanding round flies off,
And leaves a mighty void, a spacious womb,
Might teem with new creation; re-inflam'd
Thy luminaries triumph, and assume
Divinity themselves. Nor was it strange,
Matter high-wrought to such surprising pomp
Such godlike glory, stole the style of gods,
From ages dark, obtuse, and steep'd in sense,
For, sure, to sense, they truly are divine;
And half-absolv'd idolatry from guilt;
Nay, turn'd it into virtue. Such it was
In those, who put forth all they had of man
Unlost, to lift their thought, nor mounted higher;
But, weak of wings, on planets perch'd; and thought
What was their highest, must be their ador'd.
But they how weak, who could no higher mount And are there, then, Lorenzo! those, to whom Unseen, and unexistent, are the same?
And if incomprehensible is join'd,
Who dare pronounce it madness, to believe?
Why has the mighty builder thrown aside
All measure in his work; stretch'd out his line
So far, and spread amazement o'er the whole?
Then (as he took delight in wide extremes)
Deep in the bosom of his universe,
Dropt down that reasoning mite, that insect, man,
To crawl, and gaze, and wonder at the scene?—
That man might ne'er presume to plead amazement
For disbelief of wonders in himself.
Shall God be less miraculous, than what
His hand has form'd? Shall mysteries descend
From un-mysterious? Things more elevate,
Be more familiar? Uncreated lie
More obvious than created, to the grasp
Of human thought? The more of wonderful
Is heard in him, the more we should assent.
Could we conceive him, God he could not be;
Or he not God, or we could not be men.
A God alone can comprehend a God;
Man's distance how immense! On such a theme,
Know this, Lorenzo! (seem it ne'er so strange)
Nothing can satisfy, but what confounds;
Nothing, but what astonishes, is true.
The scene thou seest, attests the truth I sing,
And every star sheds light upon thy creed.
These stars, this furniture, this cost of Heaven,
If but reported, thou hadst ne'er believ'd;
But thine eye tells thee, the romance is true.
The grand of Nature is th' Almighty's oath,
In reason's court, to silence unbelief.
How my mind, opening at this scene, imbibes
The moral emanations of the skies,
While nought, perhaps, Lorenzo less admires !
Has the Great Sovereign sent ten thousand world
To tell us, he resides above them all,
In glory's unapproachable recess?
And dare Earth's bold inhabitants deny
The sumptuous, the magnific embassy
A moment's audience? Turn we, nor will hear
From whom they come, or what they would impart
For man's emolument; sole cause that stoops
Their grandeur to man's eye? Lorenzo! rouse;
Let thought, awaken'd, take the lightning's wing,
And glance from east to west, from pole to pole.
Who sees, but is confounded, or convinc'd?
Renounces reason, or a God adores?
Mankind was sent into the world to see:
Sight gives the science needful to their peace,
That obvious science asks small learning's aid.
Wouldst thou on metaphysic pinions soar?
Or wound thy patience amid logic thorns?
Or travel history's enormous round?
Nature no such hard task enjoins: she gave
A make to man directive of his thought;
A make set upright, pointing to the stars,
As who shall say, "Read thy chief lesson there.
Too late to read this manuscript of Heaven,
When, like a parchment-scroll shrunk up by flames, Celestial art's intent. The trembling stars
It folds Lorenzo's lesson from his sight.
Lesson how various! Not the God alone,
I see his ministers: I see, diffus'd
In radiant orders, essences sublime,
Of various offices, of various plume,
In heavenly liveries distinctly clad,
Azure, green, purple, pearl, or downy gold,
Or all commix'd; they stand, with wings outspread,
Listening to catch the master's least command,
And fly through Nature, ere the moment ends;
Numbers innumerable!-Well conceiv'd
By Pagan, and by Christian! O'er each sphere
Presides an angel, to direct its course,
And feed, or fan, its flames; or to discharge
Other high trusts unknown. For who can see
Such pomp of matter, and imagine, mind,
For which alone inanimate was made,
More sparingly dispens'd? That nobler son,
Far liker the great Sire!-"Tis thus the skies
Inform us of superiors numberless,
As much in excellence, above mankind,
As above Earth, in magnitude, the spheres.
These, as a cloud of witnesses, hang o'er us;
In a throng'd theatre are all our deeds;
Perhaps, a thousand demi-gods descend
On every beam we see, to walk with men.
Awful reflection! Strong restraint from ill!
Yet, here, our virtue finds still stronger aid
From these ethereal glories sense surveys.
See crimes gigantic, stalking through the gloom
With front erect, that hide their head by day,
And making night still darker by their deeds.
Slumbering in covert, till the shades descend,
Rapine and murder, link'd, now prowl for prey.
The miser earths his treasure; and the thief,
Watching the mole, half-beggars him ere morn.
Now plots, and foul conspiracies, awake;
And, muffling up their horrors from the Moon,
Havoc and devastation they prepare,
And kingdoms tottering in the field of blood.
Now sons of riot in mid-revel rage.
What shall I do ?-Suppress it? or proclaim?—
Why sleeps the thunder? Now, Lorenzo! now,
His best friend's couch the rank adulterer
Ascends secure; and laughs at gods and men.
Preposterous madmen, void of fear or shame,
Lay their crimes bare to these chaste eyes of Heaven;
Yet shrink, and shudder, at a mortal's sight.
Were Moon and stars for villains only made?
To guide, yet screen them, with tenebrious light?
No, they were made to fashion the sublime
Of human hearts, and wiser make the wise.
Those ends were answer'd once; when mortals
Of stronger wing, of aquiline ascent
In theory sublime. O how unlike
Those vermin of the night, this moment sung,
Who crawl on Earth, and on her venom feed!
Those ancient sages, human stars! they met
Something, like magic, strikes from this blue vault; Their brothers of the skies, at midnight hour;
With just attention is it view'd? We feel
A sudden succor, unimplor'd, unthought;
Nature herself does half the work of man.
Seas, rivers, mountains, forests, deserts, rocks,
The promontory's height, the depth profound
Of subterranean, excavated grots,
Black-brow'd, and vaulted high, and yawning wide
From Nature's structure, or the scoop of Time,
If ample of dimension, vast of size,—
E'en these an aggrandizing impulse give;
Of solemn thought enthusiastic heights
E'en these infuse.-But what of vast in these?
Nothing; or we must own the skies forgot.
Much less in art!-Vain art! Thou pigmy power!
How dost thou swell and strut, with human pride,
To show thy littleness! What childish toys,
Thy watery columns squirted to the clouds!
Thy bason'd rivers, and imprison'd seas!
Thy mountains moulded into forms of men!
Thy hundred-gated capitals! or those
Where three days' travel left us much to ride;
Gazing on miracles by mortals wrought,
Arches triumphal, theatres immense,
Or nodding gardens pendent in mid-air!
Or temples proud to meet their gods half-way!
Yet these affect us in no common kind.
What then the force of such superior scenes?
Enter a temple, it will strike an awe:
What awe from this the Deity has built!
A good man seen, though silent, counsel gives:
The touch'd spectator wishes to be wise:
In a bright mirror his own hands have made,
Here we see something like the face of God.
Seems it not then enough, to say, Lorenzo!
To man abandon'd, "Hast thou seen the skies?"
And yet, so thwarted Nature's kind design
By daring man, he makes her sacred awe
(That guard from ill) his shelter, his temptation
To more than common guilt, and quite inverts
Their counsel ask'd; and, what they ask'd, obey'd.
The Stagyrite, and Plato, he who drank
The poison'd bowl, and he of Tusculum,
With him of Corduba (immortal names!)
In these unbounded, and Elysian, walks,
An area fit for gods, and godlike men,
They took their nightly round, through radiant paths
By seraphs trod; instructed, chiefly, thus,
To tread in their bright footsteps here below;
To walk in worth still brighter than the skies.
There they contracted their contempt of Earth ;
Of hopes eternal kindled, there, the fire;
There, as in near approach, they glow'd, and grew
(Great visitants!) more intimate with God,
More worth to men, more joyous to themselves.
Through various virtues, they, with ardor, ran
The zodiac of their learn'd illustrious lives.
In Christian hearts, O for a Pagan zeal!
A needful, but opprobrious prayer! as much
Our ardor less, as greater is our light.
How monstrous this in mortals! Scarce more strange
Would this phenomenon in Nature strike,
A Sun, that froze her, or a star, that warm'd.
What taught these heroes of the moral world?
To these thou giv'st thy praise, give credit too.
These doctors ne'er were pension'd to deceive thee;
And Pagan tutors are thy taste.-They taught,
That narrow views betray to misery:
That wise it is to comprehend the whole :
That virtue rose from Nature, ponder'd well,
The single base of virtue built to Heaven:
That God and Nature our attention claim:
That Nature is the glass reflecting God,
As, by the sea, reflected is the Sun,
Too glorious to be gaz'd on in his sphere.
That mind immortal loves immortal aims:
That boundless mind affects a boundless space
That vast surveys, and the sublime of things.
The soul assimilate, and make her great,
That, therefore, Heaven her glories, as a fund Of inspiration, thus spreads out to man.
Such are their doctrines; such the night inspir'd. And what more true? What truth of greater weight?
The soul of man was made to walk the skies;
Delightful outlet of her prison here!
There, disencumber'd from her chains, the ties
Of toys terrestrial, she can rove at large;
There, freely can respire, dilate, extend,
In full proportion let loose all her powers;
And, undeluded, grasp at something great.
Nor, as a stranger, does she wander there;
But, wonderful herself, through wonder strays;
Contemplating their grandeur, finds her own ;
Dives deep in their economy divine,
Sits high in judgment on their various laws,
And, like a master, judges not amiss.
Hence greatly pleas'd, and justly proud, the soul
Grows conscious of her birth celestial; breathes
More life, more vigor, in her native air;
And feels herself at home amongst the stars;
And, feeling, emulates our country's praise.
What call we, then, the firmament, Lorenzo ?—
As earth the body, since the skies sustain
The soul with food, that gives immortal life,
Call it, the noble pasture of the mind;
Which there expatiates, strengthens, and exults,
And riots through the luxuries of thought.
Call it, the garden of the Deity.
Blossom'd with stars, redundant in the growth
Of fruit ambrosial; moral fruit to man.
Call it, the breast-plate of the true High-Priest,
Ardent with gems oracular, that give,
In points of highest moment, right response;
And ill neglected, if we prize our peace.
Thus have we found a true astrology; Thus have we found a new, and noble sense, In which alone stars govern human fates. O that the stars (as some have feign'd) let fall Bloodshed, and havoc, on embattled realms, And rescued monarchs from so black a guilt! Bourbon! this wish how generous in a foe! Wouldst thou be great, wouldst thou become a God, And stick thy deathless name among the stars, For mighty conquests on a needle's point? Instead of forging chains for foreigners, Bastile thy tutor: grandeur all thy aim? As yet thou know'st not what it is: how great, How glorious, then, appears the mind of man, When in it all the stars, and planets, roll! And what it seems, it is: great objects make Great minds, enlarging as their views enlarge; Those still more godlike, as these more divine. And more divine than these, thou canst not see. Dazzled, o'erpower'd, with the delicious draught Of miscellaneous splendors, how I reel
From thought to thought, inebriate, without end! An Eden, this! a Paradise unlost!
I meet the Deity in every view,
And tremble at my nakedness before him!
O that I could but reach the tree of life!
For here it grows, unguarded from our taste;
No flaming sword denies our entrance here;
Would man but gather, he might live for ever.
Lorenzo! much of moral hast thou seen.
Of curious arts art thou more fond? Then mark
The mathematic glories of the skies,
In number, weight, and measure, all ordain'd.
Lorenzo's boasted builders, chance, and fate,
Are left to finish his aërial towers;
Wisdom and choice, their well-known characters
Here deep impress; and claim it for their own.
Though splendid all, no splendor void of use;
Use rivals beauty; art contends with power;
No wanton waste, amid effuse expense;
The great economist adjusting all
To prudent pomp, magnificently wise.
How rich the prospect! and for ever new!
And newest to the man that views it most;
For newer still in infinite succeeds.
Then, these aërial racers, O how swift!
How the shaft loiters from the strongest string!
Spirit alone can distance the career.
Orb above orb ascending without end!
Circle in circle, without end, inclos'd!
Wheel, within wheel; Ezekiel like to thine!
Like thine, it seems a vision or a dream;
Though seen, we labor to believe it true!
What involution! what extent! what swarms
Of worlds, that laugh at Earth! immensely great '
Immensely distant from each other's spheres!
What, then, the wondrous space through which they
roll?
At once it quite ingulfs all human thought;
"Tis comprehension's absolute defeat.
Nor think thou see'st a wild disorder here;
Through this illustrious chaos to the sight,
Arrangement neat, and chastest order, reign.
The path prescrib'd, inviolably kept,
Upbraids the lawless sallies of mankind.
Worlds, ever thwarting, never interfere;
What knots are tied! How soon are they dissolv'd
And set the seeming married planets free!
They rove for ever, without error rove;
Confusion unconfus'd! nor less admire
This tumult untumultuous; all on wing!
In motion, all! yet what profound repose!
What fervid action, yet no noise! as aw'd
To silence by the presence of their Lord;
Or hush'd by his command in love to man,
And bid let fall soft beams on human rest,
Restless themselves. On yon cerulean plain,
In exultation to their God, and thine,
They dance, they sing eternal jubilee,
Eternal celebration of his praise.
But, since their song arrives not at our ear,
Their dance perplex'd exhibits to the sight
Fair hieroglyphic of his peerless power.
Mark, how the labyrinthian turns they take,
The circles intricate, and mystic maze,
Weave the grand cipher of Omnipotence;
To Gods, how great! how legible to man!
Leaves so much wonder greater wonder still ?
Where are the pillars that support the skies?
What more than Atlantean shoulder props
Th' incumbent load? what magic, what strange art
In fluid air these ponderous orbs sustains?
Who would not think them hung in golden chains?
And so they are; in the high will of Heaven,
Which fixes all; makes adamant of air,
Or air of adamant; makes all of nought,
Or nought of all; if such the dread decree.
Imagine from their deep foundations torn
The most gigantic sons of Earth, the broad
And towering Alps, all tost into the sea;
And, light as down, or volatile as air,
Their bulks enormous, dancing on the waves,
In time, and measure, exquisite; while all
The winds, in emulation of the spheres,
Tune their sonorous instruments aloft;
The concert swell, and animate the ball.
Would this appear amazing? What, then, worlds,
In a far thinner element sustain'd,
And acting the same part, with greater skill,
More rapid movement, and for noblest ends?
More obvious ends to pass, are not these stars
The seats majestic, proud imperial thrones,
On which angelic delegates of Heaven,
At certain periods, as the Sovereign nods,
Discharge high trusts of vengeance, or of love;
To clothe, in outward grandeur, grand design,
And acts most solemn still more solemnize?
Ye citizens of air! what ardent thanks,
What full effusion of the grateful heart,
Is due from man indulg'd in such a sight!
A sight so noble! and a sight so kind!
It drops new truths at every new survey!
Feels not Lorenzo something stir within,
That sweeps away all period? As these spheres
Measure duration, they no less inspire
The godlike hope of ages without end.
The boundless space, through which these rovers take
Their restless roam, suggests the sister-thought
Of boundless time. Thus, by kind Nature's skill,
To man unlabor'd, that important guest,
Eternity, finds entrance at the sight:
And an eternity, for man ordain'd,
Or these his destin'd midnight counsellors,
The stars. had never whisper'd it to man.
Nature informs, but ne'er insults, her sons.
Could she then kindle the most ardent wish
To disappoint it ?—That is blasphemy.
Thus, of thy creed a second article,
Momentous, as the existence of a God,
Is found (as I conceive) where rarely sought:
And thou may'st read thy soul immortal, here.
Here, then, Lorenzo! on these glories dwell;
Nor want the guilt-illuminated roof,
That calls the wretched gay to dark delights.
Assemblies?-This is one divinely bright;
Here, unendanger'd in health, wealth, or fame,
Range through the fairest, and the Sultan scorn.
He, wise as thou, no crescent holds so fair,
As that, which on his turban awes a world;
And thinks the Moon is proud to copy him.
Look on her, and gain more than worlds can give,
A mind superior to the charms of power.
Thou muffled in delusions of this life!
Can yonder Moon turn ocean in his bed,
From side to side, in constant ebb and flow,
And purify from stench his watery realms?
And fails her moral influence? wants she power
To turn Lorenzo's stubborn tide of thought
From stagnating on Earth's infected shore,
And purge from nuisance his corrupted heart?
Fails her attraction when it draws to Heaven?
Nay, and to what thou valuest more, Earth's joy?
Minds elevate, and panting for unseen,
And defecate from sense, alone obtain
Full relish of existence undeflower'd,
The life of life, the zest of worldly bliss:
All else on Earth amounts-to what? To this:
"Bad to be suffer'd; blessings to be left:"
Earth's richest inventory boasts no more.
Of higher scenes be, then, the call obey'd.
O let me gaze!-Of gazing there's no end.
O let me think!-Thought too is wider here;
In mid-way flight imagination tires;
Yet soon reprunes her wing to soar anew,
Her point unable to forbear, or gain;
So great the pleasure, so profound the plan!
A banquet, this, where men and angels meet,
Eat the same manna, mingle Earth and Heaven.
How distant some of the nocturnal suns!
So distant (says the sage,) 'twere not absurd
To doubt, if beams, set out at Nature's birth.
Are yet arriv'd at this so foreign world;
Though nothing half so rapid as their flight.
An eye of awe and wonder let me roll,
And roll for ever: who can satiate sight
In such a scene? in such an ocean wide
Of deep astonishment? where depth, height, breadth
Are lost in their extremes; and where to count
The thick-sown glories in this field of fire,
Perhaps a seraph's computation fails.
Now, go, Ambition! boast thy boundless might
In conquest o'er the tenth part of a grain.
And yet Lorenzo calls for miracles,
To give his tottering faith a solid base.
Why call for less than is already thine?
Thou art no novice in theology;
What is a miracle?—Tis a reproach,
'Tis an implicit satire, on mankind;
And while it satisfies, it censures too.
To common sense, great Nature's course proclaims
A Deity: when mankind falls asleep,
A miracle is sent, as an alarm;
To wake the world, and prove him o'er again,
By recent argument, but not more strong.
Say, which imports more plenitude of power,
Or Nature's laws to fix, or to repeal?
To make a Sun, or stop his mid career?
To countermand his orders, and send back
The flaming courier to the freighted East,
Warm'd, and astonish'd, at his evening ray;
Or bid the Moon, as with her journey tir'd,
In Ajalon's soft, flowery vale repose?
Great things are these; still greater, to create.
From Adam's bower look down through the whole
Of miracles;-resistless is their power?
They do not, can not, more amaze the mind,
Than this, call'd un-miraculous survey,
If duly weigh'd, if rationally seen,
If seen with human eyes. The brute, indeed,
Sees nought but spangles here; the fool, no more.
Say'st thou, "The course of Nature governs all?"
The course of Nature is the art of God.
The miracles thou call'st for, this attests;
For say, Could Nature Nature's course control?
But miracles apart, who sees him not,
Nature's Controller, Author, Guide, and End!
Who turns his eye on Nature's midnight face,
But must inquire-" What hand behind the scene,
What arm almighty, put these wheeling globes
In motion, and wound up the vast machine?
Who rounded in his palm these spacious orbs?
Who bowl'd them flaming through the dark profound,
Numerous as glittering gems of morning-dew,
Or sparks from populous cities in a blaze,
And set the bosom of old night on fire?
Peopled her desert, and made horror smile?"
Or, if the military style delights thee,
(For stars have fought their battles, leagu'd with man,)
"Who marshals this bright host? enrols their
Appoints their post, their marches, and returns Punctual at stated periods? Who disbands These veteran troops, their final duty done,
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