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Whatever shocks, or gives the least offence
To virtue, delicacy, truth, or sense,
(Try the criterion, 'tis a faithful guide,)
Nor has, nor can have, Scripture on its side.
None but an author knows an author's cares,
Or fancy's fondness for the child she bears.
Committed once into the public arms,

The baby seems to smile with added charms.
Like something precious ventured far from shore,
'Tis valued for the danger's sake the more.
He views it with complacency supreme,
Solicits kind attention to his dream;

And daily more enamour'd of the cheat,
Kneels, and asks Heaven to bless the dear deceit.
So one, whose story serves at least to shew
Men loved their own productions long ago,
Woo'd an unfeeling statue for his wife,
Nor rested till the gods had given it life.
If some mere driv❜ler suck the sugar'd fib,
One that still needs his leading string and bib,
And praise his genius, he is soon repaid
In praise applied to the same part—his head :
For tis a rule, that holds for ever true,
Grant me discernment, and I grant it you.
Patient of contradiction as a child,
Affable, humble, diffident, and mild;

Such was Sir Isaac, and such Boyle and Locke:
Your blund'rer is as sturdy as a rock.
The creature is so sure to kick and bite,
A muleteer's the man to set him right.
First appetite inlists him truth's sworn foe,
Then obstinate self-will confirms him so.
Tell him he wanders; that his error leads
To fatal ills; that, though the path he treads
Be flow'ry, and he see no cause of fear,
Death and the pains of hell attend him there :
In vain; the slave of arrogance and pride,
He has no hearing on the prudent side.
His still refuted quirks he still repeats ;
New raised objections with new quibbles meets;

9

Till, sinking in the quicksand he defends,
He dies disputing, and the contest ends—
But not the mischiefs; they, still left behind,
Like thistle-seeds, are sown by ev'ry wind.

Thus men go wrong with an ingenious skill,
Bend the straight rule to their own crooked will,
And with a clear and shining lamp supplied,
First put it out, then take it for a guide.
Halting on crutches of unequal size,
One leg by truth supported, one by lies,
They sidle to the goal with awkward pace,
Secure of nothing—but to lose the race.

Faults in the life breed errors in the brain,
And these reciprocally those again.
The mind and conduct mutually imprint
And stamp their image in each other's mint :
Each, sire and dam, of an infernal race,
Begetting and conceiving all that's base.

None sends his arrow to the mark in view,
Whose hand is feeble, or his aim untrue;
For though ere yet the shaft is on the wing,
Or when it first forsakes th' elastic string,
It err but little from th' intended line,
It falls at last far wide of his design:
So he who seeks a mansion in the sky,
Must watch his purpose with a steadfast eye;
That prize belongs to none but the sincere,
The least obliquity is fatal here.

With caution taste the sweet Cireean cup;
He that sips often, at last drinks it up.
Habits are soon assumed; but when we strive
To strip them off, 'tis being flay'd alive.
Call'd to the temple of impure delight,
He that abstains, and he alone, does right.
If a wish wander that way, call it home;
He cannot long be safe whose wishes roam.
But, if you pass the threshold, you are caught;
Die then, if power almighty save you not.
There hard'ning by degrees, till double steel'd,
Take leave of Nature's God, and God reveal'd;

E

Then laugh at all you trembled at before,
And, joining the freethinkers' brutal roar,
Swallow the two grand nostrums they dispense,
That Scripture lies, and blasphemy is sense:
If clemency, revolted by abuse,

Be damnable, then damn'd without excuse.

---

Some dream that they can silence, when they will, The storm of passion, and say, " Peace, be still;" But "Thus far, and no farther," when address'd

To the wild wave, or wilder human breast,

Implies authority that never can,

That never ought to be the lot of man.

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But, Muse, forbear; long flights forebode a fall: Strike on the deep-toned chord the sum of all. Hear the just law- -the judgment of the skies! He that hates truth shall be the dupe of lies: And he that will be cheated to the last, Delusions strong as hell shall bind him fast. But if the wand'rer his mistake discern, Judge his own ways, and sigh for a return, Bewilder'd once, must he bewail his loss For ever and for ever? No-the Cross! There and there only, (though the deist rave, And atheist, if earth bear so base a slave,) There, and there only, is the power to save. There no delusive hope invites despair; No mockery meets you, no deception there. The spells and charms, that blinded you before, All vanish there, and fascinate no more.

I am no preacher, let this hint suffice,
The Cross, once seen, is death to every vice :
Else He that hung there suffer'd all his pain,
Bled, groan'd, and agonized, and died, in vain.

TRUTH.

THIS poem was partly composed while the Progress of Error still occupied the author's attention, being the second in order of his more extended productions. Its object is so clearly explained in the following extract, that, though from one of the letters already before the reader, it may be here repeated.* "I wrote that poem (Truth) on purpose to inculcate the eleemosynary character of the Gospel, as a dispensation of mercy, in the most absolute sense of the word, to the exclusion of all claims of merit on the part of the receiver; consequently to set the brand of invalidity upon the plea of works, and to discover, upon scriptural ground, the absurdity of that notion, which includes a solecism in the very terms of it, that man, by repentance and good works, may deserve the mercy of his Maker: I call it a solecism, because mercy deserved ceases to be mercy, and must take the name of justice. This is the opinion which I said in my last the world would not acquiesce in; but except this, I do not recollect that I have introduced a syllable into any of my pieces that they can possibly object to; and even this I have endeavoured to deliver from doctrinal dryness, by as many pretty things, in the way of trinket and plaything, as I could muster upon the subject." This obstinacy of a large proportion of mankind, who prefer trusting in their own most imperfect services to confiding, in humble faith, on the full and all-prevailing merits of a Saviour, Cowper farther endeavoured to conciliate by a means which did temporary injury to the cause. His fears on this point gave origin to Newton's preface-the general tone of which, by raising apprehensions of a rude attack upon themselves and their tenets, was calculated to deter such men from the volume altogether. "With respect," writes he, in a private letter, " to the poem

* See Letter 80, Vol. I. page 104.

called Truth, it is so true, that it can hardly fail of giving offence to an unenlightened reader. I think, therefore, that in order to obviate in some measure those prejudices that will naturally erect their bristles against it, an explanatory preface, such as you (and nobody so well as you) can furnish me with, will have every grace of propriety to recommend it." Cowper's fears were here, perhaps, too sensitive; but they seem to have been just. The poem is beautiful, yet has hitherto failed in obtaining the general approbation of critics, who pretend that the title raises expectations which are not fulfilled. This, we apprehend, arises from their having mistaken the object; which is not truth in the abstract, but truth as exemplified in à particular Christian doctrine- the insufficiency of works to man's salvation. In this the proper view, the poem is not only complete in its plan, but actually overflows in varied and happy illustration. The Popish anchorite-the Eastern fanatic-the sanctimonious prude-the philosopher and the lace-worker-the "heathen worthies". - the self-righteous and the humble believer before the judgment seat—the efficacy of the Cross,-all tend to enforce the main argument, and all are most finished, some sublime, sketches, considered in themselves, apart from their general propriety of sentiment and place. The poem has farther this high merit, that though treating of a subject decidedly controversial, it is so free from acrimony or partial Christianity, that the pious of either Protestant communion, Lutheran or Calvinist, may peruse it with edification and delight.

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