Light from above, from the fountain of light,
No other doctrine needs, though granted true;
But thefe are falfe, or little elfe but dreams,
Conjectures, fancies, built on nothing firm.
The first and wifest of them all profefs'd'
To know this only, that he nothing knew;
The next to fabling fell, and smooth-conceits;
A third fort doubted all things, though plain sense;
Others in virtue plac'd felicity,
But virtue join'd with riches and long life,
In corporal pleasure he, and careless ease:
The Stoic laft in philofophic pride
By him call'd virtue; and his virtuous man,
Wife, perfect in himself, and all poffeffing
Equal to God, oft shames not to prefer,
As fearing God nor man, contemning all
Wealth, pleasure, pain or torment, death and life,
Which when he lifts, he leaves, or boasts he can;
For all his tedious talk is but vain boast,
Or fubtle shifts conviction to evade.
Alas, what can they teach, and not mis-lead ;
Ignorant of themselves, of God much more,
And how the world began, and how man fell
Degraded by himself, on grace depending?
Much of the foul they talk, but all awry,
And in themselves feek virtue, and to themselves
All glory arrogate, to God give none,
Rather accufe him under ufual names,
Fortune and fate, as one regardless quite
Of mortal things. Who therefore feeks in these True wisdom, finds her not, or by delufion
Far worse, her false resemblance only meets
An empty cloud. However many books
Wife men have said are wearifom; who reads
Inceffantly, and to his reading brings not
A spirit and judgment equal or fuperior,
(And what he brings, what needs he elsewhere feek) Uncertain and unfettled still remains
Deep verst in books and shallow in himself,
Crude or intoxicate, collecting toys,
And trifles for choice matters, worth a fpunge;
As children gath'ring pebbles on the shore.
Or if I would delight my private hours
With music or with poem, where so foon
As in our native language can I find
That folace? all our law and story strew'd
With hymns, our psalms with artful terms infcrib'd
Our Hebrew songs and harps in Babylon,
That pleas'd fo well our victors ear, declare
That rather Greece from us thefe arts deriv'd;
Ill imitated, while they loudest sing
The vices of their deities, and their own
In fable, hymn, or song, so perfonating
Their gods ridiculous, and themselves past shame.
Remove the fwelling epithets thick laid
As varnish on a harlot's cheek; the rest,
Thin sown with aught of profit or delight,
Will far be found unworthy to compare
With Sion's fongs, to all true tafts excelling,
Where God is prais'd aright, and god-like men
The holiest of holies, and his faints:
Such are from God inspir'd, not such from thee:
Unless where moral virtue is exprefs'd
By light of nature not in all quite loft.
Their orators thou then extoll'ft, as thofe
The top of eloquence, statists indeed,
And lovers of their country, as may seem;
But herein to our prophets far beneath,
As men divinely taught, and better teaching
The folid rules of civil government,
In their majestick unaffected stile,
Than all the oratory of Greece and Rome.
In them is plainest taught, and easiest learnt,
What makes a nation happy, and keeps it fo,
What ruins kingdoms. and lays cities flat;
These only with our law best form a king.
So fpake the Son of God; but Satan now
Quite at a lofs, for all his darts were spent,
Thus to our Saviour with stern brow reply'd.
Since neither wealth, nor honour, arms nor arts Kingdom nor empire pleases thee, nor aught By me propos'd in life contemplative, Or active, tended on by glory, or fame, What doft thou in this world? the wilderness For thee is fittest place, I found thee there, And thither will return thee, yet remember What I foretel thee, foon thou fhalt have caufe To wish thou never hadst rejected thus
Nicely or cautiously my offer'd aid,
Which would have fet thee in short time with cafe
On David's throne, or throne of all the world,
Now at full age, fulness of time, thy feason
When prophecies of thee are best fulfill'd.
Now contrary, if I read aught in heav'n,
Or heav'n write aught of fate, by what the stars
Voluminous, or single characters,
In their conjunction met, give me to spell,
Sorrows and labours, opposition, hate,
Attends thee, fcorns, reproaches, injuries,
Violence and fripes, and lastly cruel death;
A kingdom they portend thee, but what kingdom,
Real or allegoric I difcern not,
Nor when, eternal fure, as without end,
Without beginning; for no date prefixt,
Directs me in the starry rubric fet.
So faying he took (for still he knew his pow'r
Not yet expir'd) and to the wilderness
Brought back the Son of God, and left him there,
Feigning to disappear. Darkness now rofe,
As day-light funk, and brought in lowring night
Her fhad'wy offspring, unsubstantial both,
Privation meer of light and absent day.
Our Saviour meek and with untroubled mind
After his airy jaunt, though hurry'd fore,
Hungry and cold betook him to his rest,
Wherever, under fome concourfe of fhades
Whofe branching arms thick intertwin'd might fhield
From dews and damps of night his shelter'd head,
But shelter'd flept in vain, for at his head
The tempter watch'd, and soon with ugly dreams
Disturb'd his fleep, and either tropic now
'Gan thunder, and both ends of heav'n the clouds
From many a horrid rift abortive pour'd
Fierce rain with lightning mixt, water with fire
In ruin reconcil'd: nor flept the winds
Within their ftony caves, but rufh'd abroad
From the four hinges of the world, and fell
On the vext wilderness, whose tallest pines,
Though rooted deep as high, and sturdiest oaks
Bow'd their stiff-necks, loaden with stormy blasts,
Or torn up fheer: ill waft thou shrouded then,
O patient Son of God, yet only stoodst
Unfhaken; nor yet staid the terror there,
Infernal ghosts, and hellish furies, round'
Environ'd thee, fome howl'd, fome yell'd, fome shrick'd,
Some bent at thee their fiery darts, while thou
Sat'ft unappal'd in calm and finless peace.
Thus pafs'd the night so foul, till morning fair
Came forth with pilgrim steps in amice gray;
Who with her radiant finger still'd the roar
Of thunder, chas'd the clouds, and laid the winds,
And grifly spectres which the fiend had rais'd
To tempt the Son of God with terrors dire.
And now the fun with more effectual beams
Had chear'd the face of earth, and dry'd the wet
From drooping plant, or dropping tree; the birds,
Who all things now behold more fresh and green,
After a night of storm so ruinous,
Clear'd up their choicest notes in bush and spray
To gratulate the sweet return of morn:
Nor yet amidst this joy and brightest morn
Was abfent, after all his mischief done,
The prince of darkness, glad would also seem
Of this fair change, and to our Saviour came,
Yet with no new device, they all were spent,
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