When rocks shall melt, and mountains vanish, these
Shall know their treasure; treasure them no more.
Are there (still more amazing!) who resist
The rising thought? who smother, in its birth,
The glorious truth? who struggle to be brutes!
Who through this bosom-barrier burst their way,
And, with reversed ambition, strive to sink?
Who labour downwards through the' opposing powers
Of instinct, reason, and the world against them,
To dismal hopes, and shelter in the shock
Of endless night? night darker than the grave's
Who fight the proofs of Immortality?
With horrid zeal, and execrable arts,
Work all their engines, level their black fires,
To blot from man this attribute divine,
(Than vital blood far dearer to the wise)
Blasphemers and rank atheists to themselves?
To contradict them, see all Nature rise!
What object, what event, the moon beneath,
But argues, or endears, an after-scene?
To reason proves, or weds it to desire?
All things proclaim it needful; some advance
One precious step beyond, and prove it sure.
A thousand arguments swarm round my pen,
From Heaven, and earth, and man. Indulge a few, By Nature, as her common habit, worn;
So pressing Providence, a truth to teach,
Which truth untaught, all other truths were vain.
Thou! whose all-providential eye surveys,
Whose hand directs, whose spirit fills and warms
Creation, and holds empire far beyond '
Eternity's Inhabitant august!
Of two eternities, amazing Lord!
One pass'd, ere man's or angel's had begun ;
Aid! while I rescue from the foe's assault
Thy glorious immortality in man;
-A theme for ever, and for all, of weight,
Of moment, infinite! but relish'd most
By those who love thee most, who most adore.
Nature, thy daughter, ever-changing birth
Of thee the great Immutable, to man
Speaks wisdom; is his oracle supreme;
And he who most consults her is most wise.
Lorenzo! to this heavenly Delphos haste,
And come back all immortal, all divine.
Look Nature through, 'tis revolution all;
All change, no death: day follows night, and night
The dying day: stars rise, and set, and rise:
Earth takes the' example. See, the Summer gay, 680
With her green chaplet and ambrosial flowers,
Droops into pallid Autumn: Winter gray,
Horrid with frost, and turbulent with storm,
Blows Autumn and his golden fruits away,
Then melts into the Spring: soft Spring, with breath
Favonian, from warm chambers of the south,
Recals the first. All, to reflourish, fades:
As in a wheel, all sinks to reascend :
Emblems of man, who passes, not expires.
With this minute distinction, emblems just,
Nature revolves, but man advances; both
Eternal: that a circle, this a line :
That gravitates, this soars. The' aspiring soul,
Ardent and tremulous, like flame, ascends,
Zeal and humility her wings, to Heaven.
The world of matter, with its various forms,
All dies into new life. Life born from Death
Rolls the vast mass, and shall for ever roll.
No single atom, once in being, lost,
With change of counsel charges the Most High. 700 What hence infers Lorenzo? Can it be?
Matter immortal? and shall spirit die?
Above the nobler shall less noble rise?
Shall man alone, for whom all else revives,
No resurrection know? shall man alone,
Imperial man! be sown in barren ground,
Less privileged than grain on which he feeds?
Is man, in whom alone is power to prize
The bliss of being, or, with previous pain,
Deplore its period, by the spleen of Fate,
Severely doom'd Death's single unredeem'd?
If Nature's revolution speaks aloud
In her gradation, hear her louder still.
Look Nature through, 'tis neat gradation all.
By what minute degrees her scale ascends!
Each middle nature join'd at each extreme;
To that above it join'd, to that beneath.
Parts into parts reciprocally shot,
Abhor divorce. What love of union reigns!
Here dormant matter waits a call to life;
Half-life, half-death, join there: here life and sense,
There sense from reason steals a glimmering ray;
Reason shines out in man. But how preserved
The chain unbroken upward, to the realms
Of incorporeal life? those realms of bliss,
Where Death hath no dominion? Grant a make
Half-mortal, half immortal; earthy part,
And part ethereal grant the soul of man
Eternal, or in man the series ends.
Wide yawns the gap; connexion is no more;
Check'd Reason halts; her next step wants support;
Striving to climb, she tumbles from her scheme,
A scheme Analogy pronounced so true';
Analogy! man's surest guide below.
Thus far all Nature calls on thy belief;
And will Lorenzo, careless of the call,
False attestation on all Nature charge,
Rather than violate his league with Death?
Renounce his reason, rather than renounce
The dust beloved, and run the risk of Heaven?
O what indignity to deathless souls!
What treason to the majesty of man!
Of man immortal! hear the lofty style:
'If so decreed, the' Almighty Will be done.
Let earth dissolve, yon ponderous orbs descend,
And grind us into dust. The soul is safe;
The man emerges; mounts above the wreck,
As towering flame from Nature's funeral pyre:
O'er devastation, as a gainer, smiles;
His charter his inviolable rights,
Well pleased to learn from Thunder's impotence,
Death's pointless darts, and Hell's defeated storms.'
But these chimeras touch not thee, Lorenzo !
The glories of the world thy sevenfold shield.
Other ambition than of crowns in air,
And superlunary-felicities,
Thy bosom warms. I'll cool it, if I can;
And turn those glories that enchant, against thee.
What ties thee to this life proclaims the next.
If wise, the cause that wounds thee is thy cure.
Come, my Ambitious! let us mount together,
(To mount Lorenzo never can refuse!)
And from the clouds, where Pride delights to dwell, Look down on earth.-What seest thou? wondrous
Terrestrial wonders, that eclipse the skies.
What lengths of labour'd lands; what loaded seas!
Loaded by man for pleasure, wealth, or war!
Seas, winds, and planets, into service brought,
His art acknowledge, and promote his ends.
Nor can the' eternal rocks his will withstand:
What level'd mountains! and what lifted vales!
O'er vales and mountains sumptuous cities swell,
And gild our landscape with their glittering spires.
Some mid the wondering waves majestic rise,
And Neptune holds a mirror to their charms.
Far greater still! (what cannot mortal might?)
See, wide dominions ravish'd from the deep!
The narrow'd deep with indignation foams.
Or southward turn, to delicate and grand,
The finer arts there ripen in the Sun.
How the tall temples, as to meet their gods,
Ascend the skies! the proud triumphal arch
Shows us half heaven beneath its ample bend.
High through mid air, here streams are taught to flow,
Whole rivers there, laid by in basons, sleep.
Here plains turn oceans; there vast oceans join,
Through kingdoms channel'd deep from shore to shore,
And changed Creation takes its face from man.
Beats thy brave breast for formidable scenes,
Where fame and empire wait upon the sword?
See fields in blood; hear naval thunders rise;
Britannia's voice! that awes the world to peace.
How yon enormous mole projecting breaks
The mid-sea, furious waves! their roar amidst
Outspeaks the Deity, and says, ' O Main!
Thus far, nor farther; new restraints obey.'
Earth's disembowel'd! measured are the skies!
Stars are
detected in their deep recess !
Creation widens! vanquish'd Nature yields !
Her secrets are extorted! Art prevails!
What monument of genius, spirit, power!
And now, Lorenzo! raptured at this scene, Whose glories render heaven superfluous! say, Whose footsteps these ?-Immortals have been here Could less than souls immortal this have done? Earth's cover'd o'er with proofs of souls immortal, And proofs of Immortality forgot.
To flatter thy grand foible, I confess
These are Ambition's works; and these are great:
But this, the least immortal souls can do,
Transcends them all.-But what can these transcend?
Dost ask me what?-one sigh for the distress'd.
What then for Infidels? a deeper sigh.
'Tis moral grandeur makes the mighty man!
How little they, who think aught great below! 815
All our ambitions Death defeats but one,
And that it crowns.-Here cease we; but ere long,
More powerful proof shall take the field against thee,
Stronger than death, and smiling at the tomb.
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