S the occafion of this poem was real, not fictitious, fo the method pursued in it was rather impofed by what fpontaneously arofe in the author's mind on that occafion, than meditated or defigned; which will ap pear very probable from the nature of it; for it differs from the common mode of poetry, which is, from long narrations to draw fhort morals; here, on the contrary, the narrative is fhort, and the morality arising from it makes the bulk of the poem. The reason of it is, that the facts mentioned did naturally pour these moral reflections on the thought of the writer.
ON LIFE, DEATH, AND IMMORTALITY.
Humbly infcribed to the
RIGHT HON. ARTHUR ONSLOW,
Speaker of the House of Commons.
"IR'D Nature's sweet restorer, balmy Sleep!
The, like the world, his ready vifit pays
Where Fortune smiles; the wretched he forsakes:
Swift on his downy pinion flies from woe,
And lights on lids unfully'd with a tear.
From fhort (as usual) and disturb'd repofe
I wake: how happy they who wake no more!
Yet that were vain, if dreams infest the grave.
I wake, emerging from a sea of dreams
Tumultuous; where my wreck'd defponding thought From wave to wave of fancy'd mifery
At random drove, her helm of reason loft.
Though now reftor'd, 'tis only change of pain,
(A bitter change) feverer for fevere :
The day too fhort for my diftrefs; and night,
E'en in the zenith of her dark domain,
Is funfhine to the colour of my fate.
Night, fable goddess, from her ebon throne,
In raylefs majefty, now ftretches forth
Her leaden fceptre o'er a flumb'ring world.
Silence how dead! and darkness how profound!
Nor eye nor lift'ning ear an object finds
Creation fleeps. 'Tis as the gen'ral pulse
Of life ftood still, and nature made a paufe;
An awful paufe! prophetic of her end.
And let her prophecy be foon fulfill'd:
Fate! drop the curtain; I can lofe no more.
Silence and Darkness! folemn fifters! twins
From ancient Night, who nurse the tender thought!
To reason, and on reafon build refolve,
(That column of true majesty in man)
Affitt me: I will thank you in the grave;
The grave your kingdom: there this frame shall fall A victim facred to your dreary fhrine.
But what are ye?
Thou who didft put to flight
Primeval Silence, when the morning stars,
Exulting, shouted o'er the rifing ball;
O Thou! whofe word from folid darkness struck
That fpark, the fun, ftrike wisdom from my foul; 40
My foul, which flies to thee, her truft, her treasure,
As mifers to their gold, while others rest.
Through this opaque of nature and of soul,
This double night, tranfmit one pitying ray,
To lighten and to cheer. O lead my mind,
(A mind that fain would wander from its woe)
Lead it through various fcenes of life and death,
And from each scene the nobleft truths inspire.
Nor lefs infpire my conduct than my fong;
Teach my best reafon reason; my best will
Teach rectitude; and fix my firm resolve
Wifdom to wed, and pay her long arrear:
Nor let the phial of thy vengeance, pour'd
On this devoted head, be pour'd in vain.
The bell ftrikes one. We take no note of time, 55 But from its lofs. To give it then a tongue Is wife in man. As if an angel fpoke I feel the folemn found. If heard aright,
It is the knell of my departed hours.
Where are they? With the years beyond the flood. 60
It is the fignal that demands difpatch:
How much is to be done? My hopes and fears
Start up alarm'd, and o'er life's narrow verge
Look down-on what? a fathomlefs abyfs.
A dread eternity! how furely mine!
And can eternity belong to me,
Poor penfioner on the bounties of an hour?
How poor, how rich, how abject, how august,
How complicate, how wonderful, is man!
How paffing wonder He who made him fuch!
Who centred in our make such strange extremes
From diff'rent natures marvellously mix'd,
Connexion exquifite of diftant worlds!
Diftinguifh'd link in being's endless chain!
Midway from nothing to the Deity!
A beam etherial, fully'd and abforp'd!
Though fully'd and difhonour'd, ftill divine!
Dim miniature of greatnefs abfolute !
An heir of glory! a frail child of duft!
Helpless immortal! infect infinite!
A worm! a god!-I tremble at myself,
And in myself am loft. At home a stranger,
Thought wanders up and down, furpris'd, aghaft,
And wond'ring at her own. How reafon reels!
O what a miracle, to man, is man,
Triumphantly diftrefs'd! what joy! what dread!
Alternately transported and alarmed!
What can preferve my life! or what destroy !'
An angel's arm can't fnatch me from the grave:
Legions of angels can't confine me there.
'Tis paft conjecture; all things rife in proof.
While o'er my limbs Sleep's foft dominion (pread,
What though my soul fantastic measures trod
O'er fairy fields, or mourn'd along the gloom
Of pathlefs woods, or down the craggy steep
Hurl'd headlong, swam with pain the mantled pool,
Or fcal'd the cliff, or danc'd on hollow winds,
With antic shapes, wild natives of the brain?
Her ceafelefs flight, though devious, speaks her nature
Of fubtler effence than the trodden clod,
Active, aerial, tow'ring unconfin'd,
Unfetter'd with her grofs companion's fall.
E'en filent night proclaims my foul immortal;
E'en filent night proclaims eternal day.
For human weal heaven hufbands all events:
Dull fleep inftructs, nor sport vain dreams in vain.
Why then their lofs deplore that are not loft?
Why wanders wretched Thought their tombs around
In infidel diftrefs? Are angels there?
Slumbers, rak'd up in duft, etherial fire?
They live! they greatly live a life on earth
Unkindled, unconceiv'd, and from an eye
Of tenderness let heavenly pity fall
On me, more juftly number'd with the dead.
This is the defart, this the folitude:
How populous, how vital is the grave!
This is Creation's melancholy vault,
The vale funereal, the fad cyprefs gloom;
The land of apparitions, empty fhades!
All, all on earth is fhadow, all beyond
Is fubftance; the reverfe is Folly's creed.
How folid all, where change fhall be no more?
This is the bud of being, the dim dawn,
The twilight of our day, the vestibule.
Life's theatre as yet is fhut, and Death,
Strong Death, alone can heave the maffy bar,
This grofs impediment of clay remove,
And make us, embryos of existence, free.
From real life but little more remote
Is he, not yet a candidate for light,
The future embryo, flumb’ring in his fire.
Embryos we must be till we burst the shell,
Yon' ambient azure fhell, and fpring to life,
The life of gods, O transport! and of man.
Yet man, fool man! here buries all his thoughts, 135 Inters celestial hopes without one figh. Pris'ner of earth, and pent beneath the moon, Here pinions all his wifhes; wing'd by heaven
To fly at infinite, and reach it there,
Where feraphs gather immortality,
On Life's fair tree, faft by the throne of God.
What golden joys ambrosial clust’ring glow
In his full beam, and ripen for the just,
Where momentary ages are no more!
Where Time, and Pain, and Chance, and Death expire!
And is it in the flight of threescore years
To push eternity from human thought,
And mother fouls immortal in the duft?
A foul immortal, fpending all her fires,
Wafting her strength in ftrenuous idleness,
Thrown into tumult, raptur'd or alarm'd,
At aught this fcene can threaten or indulge,
Refémbles ocean into tempeft wrought,
To waft a feather, or to drown a fly.
Where falls this cenfure? It o'erwhelms myself.
How was my heart incrufted by the world!
O how felf-fetter'd was my grov'ling foul!
How, like a worm, was I wrapt round and round
In filken thought, which reptile Fancy fpun,
Till darken'd Reason lay quite clouded o'er,
With foft conceit of endless comfort here,
Nor yet put forth her wings to reach the skies!
Night-vifions may befriend (as sung above :)
How I dream'd
Our waking dreams are fatal.
Of things impoffible! (could fleep do more ?)
Of joys perpetual in perpetual change!
Of ftable pleasures on the toffing wave!
Eternal funfhine in the ftorms of life!
How richly were my noontide trances hung
With gorgeous tapestries of pictur'd joys!
Joy hehind joy, in endless perfpective!
Till at Death's toll, whofe restless iron tongue
Calls daily for his millions at a meal,
Starting I woke, and found myself undone.
Where now my frenzy's pompous furniture?
The cobweb'd cottage, with its ragged wall
Of mould'ring mud, is royalty to me!
The fpider's moft attenuated thread
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