THE

COMPLAINT;

O R,

NIGHT-THOUGHTS:

O N

LIFE, DEATH, AND IMMORTALITY..

TO WHICH IS ADDED.

A Paraphrafe on Part of the Book of JOB..

6583706

Sovická knihovna

PREFACE.

S

As the occafion of this poem was real, not ficti- tious; fo the method pursued in it, was rather impofed, by what spontaneously arose in the author's mind, on that occafion, than meditated, or defigned. Which will appear very probable from the nature of it. For it differs from the common mode of poetry; which is, from long narrations to draw short morals: Here, on the contrary, the narrative is short, and the morality arifing 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.

THE

COMPLAINT.

NIGHT THE FIRST.

On LIFE, DEATH, and IMMORTALITY.

Humbly infcribed

To the Right Honourable ARTHUR ONSLOW, Efq; Speaker of the Houfe of Commons.

Ir'd Nature's fweet reftorer, balmy SLEEP!

THe, like the world, his ready vifit pays,

Where fortune fmiles; the wretched he forfakes:
Swift on his downy pinion flies from wo,
And lights on lids unfully'd with a tear.

From fhort, (as ufual) and difturb'd repose,
I wake: how happy they who wake no more!
Yet that were vain, if dreams infeft the
grave.
I wake, emerging from a fea 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,
Even 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 general pulfe
A

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