And, after all his years employ'd to know
The satisfactions of a life so low,

Nine hundred, or nine hundred thousand, past,
Another death to come, and Hell, at last-
-But for that new mysterious birth of life;
That promis'd seed to Adam and his wife;
That quick'ning spirit to a poor dead soul;
Not part of scripture doctrine, but the whole;
Which writers, figuring away, have left
A mere dead letter, of all sense bereft;
But for that only help of man forlorn,
The incarnation of the Virgin-born.

This Serpent-bruiser, son of God and man,
Who, from the first, his saving work began,
Revers'd, in full maturity of time,

In his own sacred person, Adam's crime;
Brought human nature from its deadly fall,
And made salvation possible for all.

Without acknowledging that Adam dy'd,
Scripture throughout is, in effect, deny'd:
All the whole process of redeeming love,
Of life, of light, and spirit from above,
Loses, by learning's piteous pretence
Of modes, and metaphors, its real sense:
All the glad tidings, in the gospel found,
Are sunk in empty and unmeaning sound.

If, by the first man's sin, we understand
Only some breach of absolute command
Half-punish'd, half-remitted, by a grace
Like that which takes in human acts a place;
The more we write, the more we still expose
The Christian doctrine to its reas'ning foes:
But, once convinc'd, that Adam, by his crime,
Fell from eternal life to that of time;
Stood on the brink of death eternal too,
Unless created unto life anew,
Then ev'ry reason teaches us to see

How all the truths of sacred writ agree;

How life restor'd arises from the grave;
How man could perish, and how Christ could save.
Man perish'd by the deadly food he took,
And needs must lose the life that he for ook,
Not unadvis'd-the moment he inclin'd
To this inferior life his nobler mind,
God kindly warn'd him to continue fed
With food of Paradise, with angels bread;
To shun the tree, the knowledge, whose sad leav'n
Would quench in him the light and life of
Strip him of that angelical array, [Heav'n;
Which thro' his outward body spread the day;
Kept it from ev'ry curse of sin and shame,
From all those evils that bad yet no name:
That prov'd alas! when he would not refrain,
The loss of Adam's proper life too plain.
Who can suppose that God would e'er forbid
To eat what would not hurt him, if he did?
Fright his lov'd creature by a false alarm;
Or make what, in itself, was harmless, harm?
O how much better he from whom I draw,
Tho' deep, yet clear the system, master Law!
Master, I call him; not that I incline
To pin my faith on any one divine;
But, man or woman, whosoe'er it be,
That speaks true doctrine, is a pope to me.
Where truth alone is interest, and aim,
Who wou'd regard a person, or a name?
Or, in the search of it impartial, scoff,
Or scorn the meanest instrument thereof?
Pardon me, sir, for having dar'd to dwell
Upon a truth already told so well:

Since diff'rent ways of telling may excite,
In diff'rent minds, attention to what's right;
And men (I measure by myself) sometimes,
Averse to reas'ning, may be taught by rhymes;
If where one fails, they will not take offence,
Nor quarrel with the words, but seek the sense.

Life, death, and such like words, in scripture
Have certainly an higher, deeper ground, [found,
Than that of this poor perishable ball,
Whereon men doat, as if it were their all;
As if they were like Warburtonian Jews,
Or, Christians nam'd, had still no higher views;
As if their years had never taught them sense
Beyond-It is all one a hundred hence.
'Twas of such worldlings that our Saviour said
To one of his disciples, "Let the dead
Bury their dead: but do thou follow me."
He makes no more distinction, sir, you see,
But that, with ref'rence to a life so brute,
The speaking carcases interr'd the mute.

Life, to conclude, was lost in Adam's fall, Which Christ, our resurrection, will recall: And, as death came into the world by sin, Where one begun, the other must begin. Why will the learned sages use their art, From scripture truth, so widely, to depart? But above all, a bishop, grave, and wise, Why will he shut, against plain text, his eyes? Not see that Heav'n's prediction never ly'd; That Adam fell by eating, sinn'd, and dy'd, A real death, as much as loss of sight Is death to ev'ry circumstance of light; Tho' a blind man may feel his way, and grope, Or for recover'd eyes be made to hope; We might as well set glasses on his nose, And sight, from common helps of sight, suppose, As say, when Adam's heav'nly life was kill'd, That sentence was not instantly fulfill'd.

Persuade your mitred friend, then, if you can, To re-consider, sir, the fall of man; To see, and own the depth of it; because, 'Till that is done, we may as well pick straws, As talk of what, and who, the Serpent was That brought the fall, not understood, to pass. One thing he was, sir, be what else he will: A critic, that employ'd his fatal skill To cavil upon words, and take away The sense of that which was as plain as day. And thus the world, at present, by his wiles, Tho' not in outward shape, he still beguiles; Seeking to turn, by comments low and lax, The word of God into a nose of wax; To take away the marrow, and the pith, Of all that scripture can present us with. May Heav'n deliver from his winding tours, The bishop, and us all! I am, sir, your's.

Some simpler secret, that, yet unreveal'd,
Amidst contending systems lies conceal'd.

A book, perhaps, beyond the vulgar page,
Removes at once the lumber of an àge:
Truth is presented; strikes upon our eyes;
We feel conviction, and we fear surprise:
We gaze, admire, dispute, and then the baw!--
"Fly from Enthusiasm"-that answers all.
Now, if my friend has patience to inquire,
Let us awhile from noisy scenes retire;
Let us examine sense, as well as sound,
And search the truth, the nature, and the ground.
'Tis will, imagination, and desire
Of thinking life, that constitute the fire,
The force, by which the strong volitions drive,
And form the scenes to which we are alive.
What! tho', unsprouted into outward shape,
The points of thought our grosser sight escape?
Nor bulky forms in prominent array
Their secret cogitative cause betray?
Once fix the will, and nature must begin
T'unfold its active rudiments within;
Mind governs matter, and it must obey:
To all its opening forms desire is key:
Nor mind nor matter's properties are lost,
As that shall mould, this must appear embost.
Imagination, trifling as it seems,
Big with effects, its own creation teems.
We think our wishes and desires a play,
And sport important faculties away:
Edg'd are the tools with which we trifle thus,
And carve out deep realities for us.
Intention, roving into Nature's field,
Dwells in that system which it means to build,
Itself the centre of its wish'd-for plan;
For where the heart of man is-there is man.
Ev'ry created, understanding mind
Moves as its own self-bias is inclin'd:
From God's free spirit breathed forth to be,
It must of all necessity be free;
Must have the pow'r to kindle and inflame
The subject-matter of its mental aim:
Whither it bend the voluntary view,
Realities, or fictions, to pursue :
Whether it raise its nature, or degrade,
To truth substantial, or to phantom shade,
Falshood or truth accordingly obtains;
That only which it wills to gain-it gains:
Good-if the good be vigorously sought,
And ill-if that be first resolv'd in thought.
All is one good, that nothing can remove,
While held in union, harmony, and love.
But when a selfish separating pride

Will break all bounds, and good from good divide,
"T is then extinguish'd, like a distant spark,
And pride self-doom'd into its joyless dark.
The miscreant desire turns good to ill,
In its own origin, the evil will:

A fact, that fills all histories of old,

That glares in proof, while conscious we behold
The bliss, bespoken by our Maker's voice,
Fixt, or perverted by a man's own choice.

Now when the mind determines thus its force,
The man becomes enthusiast of course.
What is enthusiasm? What can it be,
But thought enkindled to an high degree?
That may, whatever be its ruling turn,
Right, or not right, with equal ardour burn.
It must be therefore various in its kind,
As objects vary, that engage the mind:

When to religion we confine the word,
What use of language can be more absurd?
'Tis just as true, that many words beside,
As love, or zeal, are only thus apply'd :
To ev'ry kind of life they all belong;
Men may be eager, tho' their views be wrong:
And hence the reason, why the greatest foes
To true religious earnestness are those
Who fire their wits upon a diff'rent theme,
Deep in some false enthusiastic scheme.

One man politely, seiz'd with classic rage,
Dotes on old Rome, and its Augustan age;
On those great souls who then, or then abouts,
Made in their state such riots and such routs.
He fancies all magnificent and grand,
Under this mistress of the world's command:
Scarce can his breast the sad reverse abide,
The dame despoil'd of all her glorious pride:
Time, an old Goth, advancing to consume
Immortal gods, and once eternal Rome;
When the plain gospel spread its artless ray,
And rude unsculptur'd fishermen had sway;
Who spar'd no idol, tho' divinely carv'd,
Tho' Art, and Muse, and shrine-engraver, starv'd:
Who sav'd poor wretches, and destroy'd, alas!
The vital marble, and the breathing brass.
Where does all sense to him, and reason, shiue?
Behold-in Tully's rhetoric divine!
Tully! enough-high o'er the Alps he's gone,
To tread the ground that Tully trod upon;
Haply to find his statue, or his bust,
Or medal green'd with Ciceronian rust:
Perchance the rostrum-yea, the very wood,
Whereon this elevated genius stood;
When forth on Catiline, as erst he spoke,
The thunder of quousque tandem broke.

Well may this grand enthusiast deride The dulness of a pilgrim's humbler pride, Who paces to behold that part of Earth, Which to the Saviour of the world gave birth; To see the sepulchre from whence he rose; Or view the rocks that rented at his woes; Whom Pagan reliques have no force to charm, Yet e'en a modern crucifix can warm: The sacred signal who intent upon, Thinks on the sacrifice that hung thereon. Another's heated brain is painted o'er With ancient hieroglyphic marks of yore: He old Egyptian mummies can explain, And raise 'em up almost to life again; Can into deep antique recesses pry, And tell, of all, the wherefore and the why; How this philosopher, and that, has thought, Believ'd one thing, and quite another taught; Can rules, of Grecian sages long forgot, Clear up, as if they liv'd upon the spot.

What bounds to nostrum? Moses, and the Jews, Observ'd this learned legislator's views, While Israel's leader purposely conceal'd Truths, which his whole economy reveal'd; No heav'n disclos'd, but Canaan's fertile stage, And no for-ever-but a good old age; Whilst the well untaught people, kept in awe By meanless types, and unexplained law, Pray'd to their local god to grant a while The future state, of corn, and wine, and oil; "Till, by a late captivity set free, Their destin'd errour they began to see; Dropt the Mosaic scheme, to teach their youth. Dramatic Job, and Babylonish truth.

To soar aloft on obeliskal clouds;
To dig down deep into the dark-for shrouds;
To vex old matters, chronicled in Greek,
While those of his own parish are to seek;
What can come forth from such an antic taste,
But a Clarissimus Enthusiast?

Fraught with discoveries so quaint, so new,
So deep, so smart, so ipse-dixit true,
See arts and empires, ages, books, and men,
Rising, and falling, as he points the pen:
See frauds and forgeries, if ought surpass,
Of nobler stretch, the limits of his class,
Not found within that summary of laws,
Conjecture, tinsel'd with its own applause.
Where erudition so unblest prevails,
Saints, and their lives, are legendary tales;
Christians, a brain-sick, visionary crew,
That read the Bible with a Bible view,
And thro' the letter humbly hope to trace
The living word, the spirit, and the grace.
It matters not, whatever be the state
That ful-bent will and strong desires create;
Where'er they fall, where'er they love to dwell,
They kindle there their Heaven, or their Hell;
The chosen scene surrounds them as their own,
All else is dead, insipid, or unknown.
However poor and empty be the sphere,
'Tis all, if inclination centre there:
Its own enthusiasts each system knows,
Down to lac'd fops, and powder-sprinkled beaus.
Great wits, affecting, what they call, to think,
That deep immers'd in speculation sink,
Are great enthusiasts, howe'er refin'd,
Whose brain-bred notions so inflame the mind,
That, during the continuance of its heat,
The summum bonum is-its own conceit:
Critics, with all their learning recondite,
Poets, that sev'rally be-mused write;
The virtuosos, whether great or small;
The connoisseurs, that know the worth of all;
Philosophers, that dictate sentiments,
And politicians, wiser than events;

Such, and such-like, come under the same law,
Altho' their heat be from a flame of straw;
Altho' in one absurdity they chime,
To make religious entheasm a crime.

Endless to say how many of their trade
Ambition, pride, and self-conceit have made.
If one, the chief of such a num'rous name,
Let the great scholar justify his claim.
Self-love, in short, wherever it is found,
Tends to its own enthusiastic ground;

With the same force that goodness mounts above,
Sinks, by its own enormous weight, self-love-
By this the wav'ring libertine is prest,
And the rank atheist totally possest:
Atheists are dark enthusiasts indeed,
Whose fire enkindles like the smoking weed:
Lightless, and dull, the clouded fancy burns,
Wild hopes, and fears, still flashing out by turns.
Averse to Heav'n, amid the horrid gleam
They quest annihilation's monstrous theme,
On gloomy depths of nothingness to pore,
'Till all be none, and being be no more.

The sprightlier infidel, as yet more gay,
Fires off the next ideas in his way,
The dry fag-ends of ev'ry obvious doubt;
And puffs and blows for fear they should go out.
Boldly resolv'd, against conviction steel'd,
Nor inward truth, nor outward fact, to yield;

Urg'd with a thousand proofs, he stands unmov'd
Fast by himself, and scorns to be out-prov'd;
To his own reason loudly he appeals,
No saint more zealous for what God reveals.
Think not that you are no enthusiast then:
All men are such, as sure as they are men.
The thing itself is not at all to blame:
'Tis in each state of human life the same.
The fiery bent, the driving of the will,
That gives the prevalence to good, or ill.
You need not go to cloisters, or to cells,
Monks, or field preachers, to see where it dwells:
It dwells alike in balls and masquerades;
Courts, camps, and 'Changes, it alike pervades.
There be enthusiasts, who love to sit
In coffee-houses, and cant out their wit.
The first in most assemblies would you see,
Mark out the first haranguer, and that's be:
Nay 'tis what silent meetings cannot hide,
It may be notic'd by its mere outside.
Beaus and coquets would quit the magic dress,
Did not this mutual instinct both possess.
The mercer, taylor, bookseller, grows rich,
Because fine clothes, fine writings can bewitch.
A Cicero, a Shaftsbury, a Bayle,

How quick would they diminish in their sale?
Four fifths of all their beauties who would heed,
Had they not keen enthusiasts to read?

That which concerns us therefore is to see What species of enthusiasts we be; On what materials the fiery source Of thinking life shall execute its force: Whether a man shall stir up love, or hate, From the mix'd medium of this present state; Shall choose with upright heart and mind to rise, And reconnoitre Heav'n's primeval skies; Or down to lust and rapine to descend, Brute for a time, and demon at its end. Neither perhaps, the wary sceptics cry, And wait till Nature's river shall run dry; With sage reserve not passing o'er to good, Of time, lost time, are borne along the flood; Content to think such thoughtless thinking right, And common sense enthusiastic flight.

66 Fly from Enthusiasm?" Yes, fly from air, And breathe it more intensely for your care. Learn, that, whatever phantoms you embrace, Your own essential property takes place: Bend all your wits against it, 't is in vain, It must exist, or sacred, or profane. For flesh, or spirit, wisdom from above, Or from this world, an anger, or a love, Must have its fire within the human soul: 'Tis ours to spread the circle, or control; In clouds of sensual appetites to smoke, While smoth'ring lusts the rising conscience choke; Or, from ideal glimmerings, to raise, Showy and faint, a superficial blaze; Where subtle reasons, with their lambent flames, Untouch'd the things, creep round and round the Or-with a true celestial ardour fir'd, Such as at first created man inspir'd, To will, and to persist to will, the light, The love, the joy, that makes an angel bright, That makes a man, in sight of God, to shine With all the lustre of a life divine.

[names;

When true religion kindles up the fire, Who can condemn the vigorous desire? That burns to reach the end for which 't was giv'n, To shine, and sparkle in its native Heav'n?