"Tis reafon's voice obey'd His glories crown;
To give loft reafon life, He pour'd his own:
Believe, and fhew the reason of a man ;
Believe, and tafte the pleasure of a God;
Believe, and look with triumph on the tomb :
Thro' reafon's wounds alone thy faith can die;
Which dying, tenfold terror gives to death,
And dips in venom his twice-mortal sting.
Learn hence what honours, what loud peans, due
To thofe, who push our antidote afide;
Those boafted friends to reason, and to man,
Whofe fatal love stabs ev'ry joy, and leaves
Death's terror heighten'd, gnawing on his heart.
These pompous fons of reafon idoliz'd,
And vilify'd at once; of reafon dead,
Then deify'd, as monarchs were of old;
What conduct plants proud laurels on their brow?
While love of truth thro' all their camp refounds,
They draw pride's curtain o'er the noon-tide ray,
Spike up their inch of reason, on the point
Of philofophic wit, call'd Argument;
And then, exulting in their taper, cry,
"Behold the fun :" And, Indian-like, adore.
Talk they of morals? O thou bleeding Love!
Thou maker of new morals to mankind!
The grand morality is love of Thee.
As wife as SOCRATES, if fuch they were,
(Nor will they 'bate of that fublime renown)
As wife as SOCRATES, might juftly ftand
The definition of a modern fool.
A CHRISTIAN is the highest stile of man :
And is there, who the bleffed Crofs wipes off,
As a foul blot, from his difhonour'd brow?
If angels tremble, 'tis at fuch a fight:
The wretch they quit, defponding of their charge,
More ftruck with grief or wonder, who can tell?
Ye fold to fenfe! ye citizens of earth!
(For such alone the Christian banner fly)
Know ye how wife your choice, how great your gain?
Behold the picture of earth's happiest man:
"He calls his wifh, it comes; he fends it back,
"And fays, he call'd another; that arrives,
"Meets the fame welcome; yet he ftill calls on;
"Till one calls him, who varies not his call,
"But holds him faft, in chains of darknefs bound,
"Till nature dies, and judgment sets him free;
"A freedom far lefs welcome than his chain."
But grant man happy; grant him happy long;
Add to life's highest prize her latest hour;
That hour, fo late, is nimble in approach,
That, like a poft, comes on in full career:
How fwift the fhuttle flies, that weaves thy fhroud!
Where is the fable of thy former years?
Thrown down the gulph of time; as far from Thee
As they had ne'er been thine; the day in hand,
Like a bird ftruggling to get loofe, is going;
Scarce now poffefs'd, fo fuddenly 'tis gone;
And each swift moment fled, is death advanc'd
By ftrides as fwift: Eternity is All;
And whofe Eternity? Who triumphs there?
Bathing for ever in the font of blifs!
For ever basking in the Deity!
LORENZO! Who ?-Thy confcience shall reply.
O give it leave to fpeak; 'twill speak ere long,
Thy leave unafkt: LORENZO! hear it now,
While useful its advice, its accent mild.
By the great edit, the divine decree,
Truth is depofited with man's laft hour ;
An honest hour, and faithful to her truft;
Truth, eldest daughter of the Deity;
Truth, of his council, when he made the worlds;
Nor lefs, when he shall judge the worlds he made;
Tho' filent long, and fleeping ne'er fo found,
Smother'd with errors, and oppreft with toys,
That heav'n-commiffion'd hour no fooner calls,
But from her cavern in the foul's abyfs,
Like him they fable under Etna whelm'd,
The goddess burfts in thunder, and in flame;
Loudly convinces, and feverely pains.
Dark dæmons I discharge, and Hydra-ftings;
The keen vibration of bright truth-is Hell:
Juft definition! tho' by schools untaught.
Ye deaf to truth! perufe this Parfon'd page,
And truft, for once, a prophet, and a priest;
"Men may live fools, but fools they cannot die."
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