Shone brighter ftill, once call'd to public view.
'Tis therefore many, whofe fequefter'd lot Forbids their interference, looking on,
Anticipate perforce fome dire event;
And seeing the old castle of the state,
That promis'd once more firmness, so affail'd,
That all its tempeft-beaten turrets shake,
Stand motionless, expectants of its fall.
All has its date below; the fatal hour
Was register'd in heav'n ere time began.
We turn to duft, and all our mightiest works
Die too: the deep foundations that we lay,
Time ploughs them up, and not a trace remains.
We build with what we deem eternal rock;
A diftant age asks where the fabric stood,
And in the duft, fifted and fearch'd in vain,
The undiscoverable fecret fleeps.
But there is yet a liberty unfung
By poets, and by fenators unprais'd,
Which monarchs cannot grant, nor all the powers
Of earth and hell confed'rate take away.
A liberty, which perfecution, fraud,
Oppreffion, prifons, have no power to bind,
Which whofo taftes can be enflav'd no more.
'Tis liberty of heart, derived from heav'n,
Bought with HIS blood who gave it to mankind,
And feal'd with the fame token. It is held
By charter, and that charter fanction'd fure
By th' unimpeachable and awful oath
And promise of a God. His other gifts
All bear the royal ftamp that speaks them his,
And are august, but this transcends them all.
His other works, this vifible difplay
Of all-creating energy and might,
Are grand, no doubt, and worthy of the word
That, finding an interminable space
Unoccupied, has filled the void fo well,
And made so sparkling what was dark before.
But these are not his glory. Man, 'tis true,
Smit with the beauty of fo fair a scene,
Might well fuppofe th' artificer divine
Meant it eternal, had he not himself
Pronounc'd it tranfient, glorious as it is,
And still defigning a more glorious far,
Doom'd it, as infufficient for his praise.
These therefore are occafional and pass;
Form'd for the confutation of the fool,
Whose lying heart disputes against a God;
That office ferv'd, they must be swept away.
Not fo the labours of his love: they fhine
In other heav'ns than these that we behold,
And fade not. There is paradife that fears
No forfeiture, and of its fruits he fends
Large prelibation oft to faints below.
Of these the first in order, and the pledge
And confident affurance of the rest,
Is Liberty. A flight into his arms
Ere yet mortality's fine threads give way,
A clear escape from tyrannizing luft,
And full immunity from penal woe.
Chains are the portion of revolted man,
Stripes and a dungeon; and his body ferves
The triple purpose. In that fickly, foul,
Opprobrious refidence, he finds them all.
Propense his heart to idols, he is held
In filly dotage on created things,
Careless of their Creator. And that low
And fordid gravitation of his pow'rs
To a vile clod, fo draws him, with fuch force
Refiftlefs from the center he fhould feek,
That he at last forgets it. All his hopes
Tend downward, his ambition is to fink,
To reach a depth profounder ftill, and ftill
Profounder, in the fathomlefs abyss
Of folly, plunging in purfuit of death.
But ere he gain the comfortless repose
He feeks, and acquiefcence of his foul
In heav'n-renouncing exile, he endures
What does he not? from lufts oppos'd in vain,
And felf-reproaching confcience. He forefees
The fatal iffue to his health, fame, peace,
Fortune and dignity; the lofs of all
That can ennoble man, and make frail life,
Short as it is, fupportable. Still worse,
Far worse than all the plagues with which his fins
Infect his happiest moments, he forebodes
Ages of hopeless mifery. Future death,
And death ftill future. Not an hafty stroke,
Like that which fends him to the dusty grave,
But unrepealable enduring death.
Scripture is still a trumpet to his fears:
What none can prove a forg'ry, may be true,
What none but bad men with exploded, must.
That fcruple checks him. Riot is not loud
Nor drunk enough to drown it. In the midft
Of laughter his compunctions are sincere,
And he abhors the jeft by which he fhines.
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