As God's ambaffador, the grand concerns
Of judgment and of mercy, fhould beware
Of lightness in his fpeech. 'Tis pitiful
To court a grin, when you should woo a foul;
To break a jeft, when pity would inspire
Pathetic exhortation; and to address
The skittish fancy with facetious tales,
When fent with God's commiffion to the heart!
So did not Paul. Direct me to a quip
Or merry turn in all he ever wrote,
And I confent you take it for your text,
Your only one, till fides and benches fail.
No: he was ferious in a ferious caufe,
And underfood too well the weighty terms,
That he had taken in charge. He would not ftoop
To conquer thofe by jocular exploits,
Whom truth and fobernefs affailed in vain.
Oh popular applaufe! what heart of man
Is proof againft thy fweet feducing charms?
The wifeft and the best feel urgent need
Of all their caution in thy gentleft gales;
But fwelled into a guft-who then alas!
With all his canvafs fet, and inexpert,
And therefore heedlefs, can withstand thy power?
Praise from the riveled lips of toothless bald
Decrepitude, and in the looks of lean
And craving poverty, and in the bow
Refpectful of the fmutched artificer,
Is oft too welcome, and may much difturb
The bias of the purpose. How much more,
Poured forth by beauty fplendid and polite,
In language foft as adoration breathes?
Ah 1pare your idol! think him human ftill.
Charms he may have, but he has frailties too!
Dote not too much, nor spoil what ye admire.
All truth is from the fempiternal fource
Of light divine. But Egypt, Greece, and Rome,
Drew from the ftream below. More favoured we
Drink, when we choose it, at the fountain head.
To them it flowed much mingled and defiled
With hurtful error, prejudice, and dreams
Illufive of philosophy, fo called,
But falfely. Sages after fages ftrove
In vain to filter off a cryftal draught
Pure from the lees, which often more enhanced
The thirst than flaked it, and not feldom bred
Intoxication and delirium wild.
In vain they pushed inquiry to the birth
And fpring-time of the world; asked, Whence is man? Why formed at all? and wherefore as he is?
Where muft he find his Maker? with what rites
Adore him? Will he hear, accept, and blefs?
Or does he fit regardless of his works?
Has man within him an immortal feed?
Or does the tomb take all? If he furvive
His afhes, where? and in what weal or woe?
Knots worthy of solution, which alone
A Deity could folve. Their answers, vague
And all at random, fabulous and dark,
Left them as dark themselves. Their rules of life
Defective and unfanctioned, proved too weak
To bind the roving appetite, and lead
Blind nature to a God not yet revealed.
'Tis revelation fatisfies all doubts,
Explains all myfteries, except her own,
And fo illuminates the path of life,
That fools difcover it, and ftray no more.
Now tell me, dignified and fapient fir,
My man of morals, nurtured in the shades
Of Academus-is this falfe or true?
Is Chrift the abler teacher, or the fchools?
If Chrift, then why refort at every turn
To Athens or to Rome, for wisdom short
Of man's occafions, when in him refide
Grace, knowledge, comfort-an unfathomed ftore?
How oft, when Paul has ferved us with a text,
Has Epictetus, Plato, Tully, preached!
Men that, if now alive, would fit content
And humble learners of a Saviour's worth,
Preach it who might. Such was their love of truth, Their thirft of knowledge, and their candour too!
And thus it is. The paftor, either vain
By nature, or by flattery made so, taught
To gaze at his own splendour, and to exalt.
Abfurdly, not his office, but himself;
Or unenlightened, and too proud to learn;
Or vicious, and not therefore apt to teach;
Perverting often, by the stress of lewd
And loose example, whom he should inftruct;
Expofes, and holds up to broad disgrace,
The nobleft function, and difcredits much
The brightest truths, that man has ever seen.
For ghoftly counfel; if it either fall
Below the exigence, or be not backed
With fhow of love, at leaft with hopeful proof
Of some fincerity on the giver's part;
Or be dishonoured in the exterior form
And mode of its conveyance by fuch tricks,
As move derifion, or by foppish airs
And hiftrionic mummery, that let down
The pulpit to the level of the stage;
Drops from the lips a difregarded thing.
The weak perhaps are moved, but are not taught, While prejudice in men of ftronger minds
Takes deeper root, confirmed by what they fee. A relaxation of religion's hold
Upon the roving and untutored heart
Soon follows, and, the curb of conscience snapt,
The laity run wild-But do they now?
Note their extravagance, and be convinced.
As nations, ignorant of God, contrive
A wooden one; fo we, no longer taught.
By monitors, that mother church supplies,
Now make our own. Pofterity will ask
(If e'er pofterity fee verfe of mine)
Some fifty or an hundred luftrums hence,
What was a monitor in George's days?
My very gentle reader, yet unborn,
Of whom I needs muft augur better things,
Since heaven would fure grow weary of a world Productive only of a race like our's,
A monitor is wood-plank fhaven thin.
And neatly fitted, it compreffes hard
The prominent and moft unfightly bones,
And binds the fhoulders flat. We prove its ufe
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