While honour, virtue, piety, bear sway,
They flourish; and as these decline, decay :
In just resentment of his injur'd laws,
He pours contempt on them, and on their cause :
Strikes the rough thread of errour right athwart
The web of ev'ry scheme they have at heart;
Bids rottenness invade and bring to dust
The pillars of support, in which they trust,
And do his errand of disgrace and shame
On the chief strength and glory of the frame.
None ever yet impeded what he wrought,
None bars him out from his most secret thought;
Darkness itself before his eye is light,
And Hell's close mischief naked in his sight.
Stand now and judge thyself-Hast thou incurr'd His anger, who can waste thee with a word; Who poises and proportions sea and land, Weighing them in the hollow of his hand : And in whose awful sight all nations seem As grasshoppers, as dust, a drop, a dream? Hast thou, (a sacrilege his soul abhors,) Claim'd all the glory of thy prosperous wars? Proud of thy fleets and armies, stol'n the gem Of his just praise, to lavish it on them? Hast thou not learn'd, what thou art often told, A truth still sacred, and believ'd of old, That no success depends on spears and swords Unblest, and that the battle is the Lord's? That courage is his creature, and dismay
The post that at his bidding speeds away,
Ghastly in feature, and his stamm'ring tongue
With doleful rumour and sad presage hung,
To quell the valour of the stoutest heart,
And teach the combatant a woman's part?
That he bids thousands fly where none pursue,
Saves as he will by many or by few,
And claims for ever as his royal right,
Th' event and sure decision of the fight?
The cry in all thy ships is still the same,
Speed us away to battle and to fame.
Thy mariners explore the wild expanse,
Impatient to descry the flags of France:
But though they fight as thine have ever fought,
Return asham'd without the wreaths they sought.
Thy senate is a scene of civil jar,
Chaos of contrarieties at war;
Where sharp and solid, phlegmatick and light,
Discordant atoms meet, ferment, and fight;
Where Obstinacy takes his sturdy stand,
To disconcert what Policy has plann'd ;
Where Policy is busied all night long
In setting right what Faction has set wrong;
Where flails of oratory thresh the floor,
That yields them chaff and dust, and nothing more.
Thy rack'd inhabitants repine, complain,
Tax'd till the brow of Labour sweats in vain;
War lays a burden on the reeling state,
And peace does nothing to relieve the weight;
Successive loads succeeding broils impose,
And sighing millions prophesy the close.
Is adverse Providence, when ponder'd well,
So dimly writ, or difficult to spell,
Thou canst not read with readiness and ease
Providence adverse in events like these?
Know, then, that heavenly wisdom on this ball
Creates, gives birth to, guides, consummates all; 315
That while laborious and quick-thoughted man
Snuffs up the praise of what he seems to plan,
He first conceives, then perfects his design,
As a mere instrument in hands divine:
Blind to the working of that secret pow'r,
That balances the wings of ev'ry hour,
The busy trifler dreams himself alone,
Frames many a purpose, and God works his own.
States thrive or wither as moons wax and wane,
E'en as his will and his decrees ordain ;
Thy fastings, when calamity at last
Suggests th' expedient of a yearly fast,
What mean they? Canst thou dream there is a pow'r
In lighter diet at a later hour,
To charm to sleep the threat'ning of the skies,
And hide past folly from all-seeing eyes?
The fast that wins deliverance, and suspends
The stroke that a vindictive God intends,
Is to renounce hypocrisy; to draw
Thy life upon the pattern of the law;
To war with pleasure, idoliz'd before;
To vanquish lust, and wear its yoke no more.
All fasting else, whate'er be the pretence,
Is wooing mercy by renew'd offence.
Hast thou within thee sin, that in old time
Brought fire from Heav'n, the sex-abusing crime, 415
Whose horrid perpetration stamps disgrace,
Baboons are free from, upon human race?
Think on the fruitful and well-water'd spot
That fed the flocks and herds of wealthy Lot.
Where Paradise seem'd still vouchsaf'd on earth, 420
Burning and scorch'd into perpetual dearth;
Or in his words who damn'd the base desire,
Suff'ring the vengeance of eternal fire;
Then Nature injur'd, scandaliz'd, defil'd,
Unveil'd her blushing cheek, look'd on, and smil'd; 425
Beheld with joy the lovely scene defac'd,
And prais'd the wrath that laid her beauties waste.
Far be the thought from any verse of mine,
And farther still the form'd and fix'd design,
To thrust the charge of deeds, that I detest,
Against an innocent unconscious breast;
The man that dares traduce, because he can
With safety to himself, is not a man :
An individual is a sacred mark
Not to be pierc'd in play, or in the dark;
But publick censure speaks a publick foe,
Unless a zeal for virtue guide the blow.
The priestly brotherhood, devout, sincere, From mean self-int'rest and ambition clear, Their hope in Heav'n, servility their scorn, Prompt to persuade, expostulate, and warn, Their wisdom pure, and giv'n them from above, Their usefulness ensur'd by zeal and love,
As meek as the man Moses, and withal
As bold as, in Agrippa's presence, Paul,
Should fly the world's contaminating touch,
Holy and unpolluted ;-are thine such?
Except a few with Eli's spirit bless'd,
Hophni and Phineas may describe the rest.
Where shall a teacher look, in days like these,
For ears and hearts that he can hope to please?
Look to the poor-the simple and the plain
Will hear perhaps thy salutary strain;
Humility is gentle, apt to learn,
Speak but the word, will listen and return,
Alas, not so!-the poorest of the flock
Are proud, and set their faces as a rock;
Denied that earthly opulence they choose,
God's better gift they scoff at and refuse.
The rich, the produce of a nobler stem,
Are more intelligent at least-try them.
Oh, vain inquiry! they, without remorse,
Are altogether gone a devious course;
Where beck'ning Pleasure leads them, wildly stray,
Have burst the bands, and cast the yoke away.
Now borne upon the wings of truth sublime,
Review thy dim original and prime.
This island, spot of unreclaim'd rude earth,
The cradle that receiv'd thee at thy birth,
Was rock'd by many a rough Norwegian blast,
And Danish howlings scar'd thee as they pass'd;
For thou wast born amid the din of arms,
And suck'd a breast that panted with alarms.
While yet thou wast a grov'ling puling chit,
Thy bones not fashion'd, and thy joints not knit, 475
The Roman taught thy stubborn knee to bow,
Though twice a Cæsar could not bend thee now:
His victory was of that orient light,
When the sun's shafts disperse the gloom of night.
Thy language at this distant moment shows
How much the country to the conqueror owes ;
Expressive, energetick, and refin'd,
It sparkles with the gems he left behind:
He brought thy land a blessing when he came ;
He found thee savage, and he left thee tame;
Taught thee to clothe thy pink'd and painted hide,
And grace thy figure with a soldier's pride;
He sow'd the seeds of order where he went,
Improv'd thee far beyond his own intent,
And, while he rul'd thee by the sword alone,
Made thee at last a warriour like his own.
Religion, if in heavenly truths attir'd,
Needs only to be seen to be admir'd ;
But thine, as dark as witch'ries of the night,
Was form'd to harden hearts and shock the sight; 495 Thy Druids struck the well-hung harps they bore
With fingers deeply dyed in human gore;
And while the victim slowly bled to death,
Upon the rolling chords rung out his dying breath.
Who brought the lamp, that with awaking beams
Dispell'd thy gloom, and broke away thy dreams, 501
Tradition, now decrepit and worn out,
Babbler of ancient fables, leaves a doubt;
But still light reach'd thee; and those gods of thine,
Woden and Thor, each tottering in his shrine,
Fell, broken and defac'd at his own door,
As Dagon in Philistia long before.
But Rome with sorceries and magick wand
Soon rais'd a cloud, that darken'd ev'ry land;
And thine was smother'd in the stench and fog
Of Tiber's marshes and the papal bog.
Then priests with bulls, and briefs, and shaven crowns, And griping fists, and unrelenting frowns,
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