And o'er my head The Conqueror spread The banner of his love. Then why, my heart, sunk down so low? Review, my soul, those pleasing days, A father's love may raise a frown, The hour of darkness is but short, Faith be thy life, and patience thy support: Nor from the dust my sorrows spring, Nor drop my comforts from the lower skies: Let all the baneful planets shed Their mingled curses on my head; How vain their curses, if th' Eternal King Look through the clouds, and bless me with his eyes! Creatures with all their boasted sway, Are but his slaves, and must obey; They wait their orders from above, And execute his word, the vengeance, or the love. "Tis by a warrant from his hand, The gentler gales are bound to sleep; Old Boreas, with his freezing powers, And chains them moveless to the shores; The grazing ox lows to the gelid skies, Walks o'er the marble meads with withering eyes, Walks o'er the solid lakes, snuffs up the wind, and dies. Fly to the polar world, my sun, And mourn the pilgrims there, (a wretched throng!) A troop of statues on the Russian plains, And magazines of frost, and magazines of flame. His sharp artillery from the north Shall pierce thee to thy soul, and shake thy mortal frame. Sublime on winter's rugged wings, He rides in arms along the sky, And scatters fate on swains and kings; And flocks, and herds, and nations die, While impious lips, profanely bold, Grow pale, and quivering at his dreadful cold, Give their own blasphemies the lie. The mischiefs that infest the earth, When the hot dog-star fires the realms on high, Are but the flashes of a wrathful eye, From the incensed Divinity. In vain our parching palates thirst The verdant fields are burnt to dust, Ye The sun has drunk all channels dry, scourges of our Maker's rod, 'Tis at his dread command, at his imperial nod, You deal your various plagues abroad. Hail, whirlwinds, hurricanes and floods, And bear down, with a mighty sweep, The riches of the fields, and honors of the woods; And bury millions in the waves; Earthquakes, that in midnight sleep Turn cities into heaps, and make our beds our graves : "Tis the Creator's voice that sounds your loud alarms, Some pledge of my Creator's love, Be thou my God, and the whole world is mine : I shall be rich till Thou art poor; For all I fear and all I wish, heaven, earth, and hell, are thine. SOFTLY the tuneful shepherd leads Rivers of peace attend his song, When kindling with victorious fire, His ensigns lighten round the sky, Ten thousand cherubs wait his course, But who those frowns of earth can draw, He spake! the cleaving waters fled, In heaps th' affrighted billows stand, See his broad sword flies o'er the strings, And Lo! the great poet shifts the scene, I'm borne aloft, and leave the crowd, Skirted with dawning gold: And try and heave the mould. "Are these the things" (my passion cried) "That we call men? Are these allied To the fair worlds of light? They have rased out their Maker's name, Graven on their minds with pointed flame, In strokes divinely bright. "Wretches! they hate their native skies; If an ethereal thought arise, Or spark of virtue shine, With cruel force they damp its plumes, "Lo! how they throng with panting breath Nor miss the dark abode." Thus while I drop a tear or two I know his candid soul afar; And bless them as they go: They soar beyond my laboring sight, |