THE 3d DAY OF THE 2d WEEK;

ABRAHAM.

PART THE FIRST; THE VOCATION:

TH' iron-footed coursers, lusty, fresh, and light, With loud proud neighings for the combat call.

While the thick arrows fhow'r on either fide,
An iron-cloud Heaven's angry face doth hide.

Go, pay to Pluto, Prince of Acheron,
That tribute thou deny'st unto thy own.

thy habit and thy tongue,

fo

Thine arms, and more thy courage, yet so young,

Shew that in Sodom's wanton walls accurft

Thou wert not born, nor in Gomorrha nurst.

Sleep flowly harness'd his dull bears anon;
And in a noiseless coach, all darkly dight,
Takes with him Silence, Drowsiness, and Night;
Th' air thickens where he goes--

The wolf in woods lies down, the ox i' th' mead,
Th' Orc under water; and on beds of down

Men

Men ftretch their limbs,

The nightingale, perch'd on the tender spring
Of sweetest hawthorn, hangs her drowsy wing;
The fwallow's filent,-

Th' yeugh moves no more, the afp doth cease to shake,

Pines bow their heads, and feem fome reft to take.

Methinks already on our glift'ring crefts
The glorious garland of the conqueft rests.

Youth paints his cheek with rofe' and lilies' dies,
A lovely light'ning fparkles in his eyes;
So that his gallant port, and graceful voice,
Confirm the fainteft, make the fad rejoice.

his glift'ring fhield,

Whose glorious fplendor darts a dreadful light.

Death and Despair, Horror and Fury, fight
Under thine enfigns in the difmal night.

Melchifedec, God's facred minifter,

And King of Salem, comes to greet him there,
Bleffing his blifs; and thus with zealous cry
Pierces devout Heaven's starful canopy.

"Bleft be the Lord, that with his hand doth roll The radiant orbs that turn about the pole !

Who

Who rules the actions of all human kind
With full command! who with a blast of wind
Razes the rocks, and rends the proudest hills,
Dries up the ocean, and the empty fills!
Bleft be the great God of great Abraham!
From age to age extolled be his name!
Let ev'ry place to him high altars build,
And every altar with his praise be fill'd!
His praise above the welkin ever ring
As loud, or louder than his angels fing!"-

1

So from the fea to the Euphratean source,
And ev'n from Dan to Nilus' crystal course,
Rings his renown!

To the dry defert's fandy horror hied,——

Hence, hence the high and mighty Prince fhall

spring,

Sin's, Death's, and Hell's eternal taming King; The facred founder of man's fov'reign bliss,

A fimple Spirit, the glitt'ring child of light,

Where folemn nuptials of the LAMB are held; Where angels bright, and souls that have excell'd, All clad in white fing th' Epithalamy,

Caroufing nectar of eternity.

PART

PART THE SECOND;

THE FATHERS.

- the voice which made all things, Which scept'reth fhepherds, or uncrowneth Kings.

So Abraham, at these sharp-founding words,
Seized at once with wonder, grief, and fright,
Is well nigh finking in eternal night;
Death's afh-pale image in his eyes doth swim,
A chilling ice shivers thro' every limb,
Flat on the ground himself he grov'ling throws,
A hundred times his colour comes and goes;
From all his body a cold dew doth drop,
His speech doth fail, and all his senses ftop.

Th' eternal pillar of all verity,—

Sometimes by his eternal self he swears,

The fable night diflodg'd,

O thou

O thou Ethereal palace Chryftalline!

Shut for ever all thy gates up

Againft my foul!

of

grace

The glorious fun of righteousness

Who fhall the mountains bruize with iron mace,
Rule Heaven and Earth, and the infernal place.

the thund'ring voice of God,

PART THE THIRD;

THE LAW,

that fteepest mount, Whose snowy shoulders with their ftony pride Eternally do Spain from France divide.