"De sacris autem hæc sit una sententia, ut conserventur."
But let us all concur in this one sentiment, that things sacred be
He lives, who lives to God alone,
And all are dead beside;
For other source than God is none,
Whence life can be supplied.
To live to God is to requite
His love as best we may;
To make His precepts our delight,
His promises our stay.
But life, within a narrow ring
Of giddy joys comprised,
Is falsely named, and no such thing,
But rather death disguised.
Can life in them deserve the name,
Who only live to prove
For what poor toys they can disclaim
An endless life above?
Who much diseased, yet nothing feel;
Much menaced, nothing dread;
Have wounds which only God can heal,
Yet never ask His aid?
Who deem His house a useless place,
Faith, want of common sense;
And ardour in the Christian race,
A hypocrite's pretence?
Who trample order; and the day
Which God asserts His own,
Dishonour with unhallow'd play,
And worship Chance alone?
If scorn of God's commands, impress'd
On word and deed, imply
The better part of man unbless'd
With life that cannot die;
Such want it; and that want uncured,
Till man resigns his breath,
Speaks him a criminal, assured
Of everlasting death.
Sad period to a pleasant course!
Yet so will God repay
Sabbaths profaned without remorse,
And mercy cast away.
For a Stone erected at the sowing of a Grove of Oaks at Chillington, the Seat of T. Giffard, Esq., 1790.
OTHER stones the era tell,
When some feeble mortal fell;
I stand here to date the birth
Of these hardy sons of earth.
Which shall longest brave the sky,
Storm and frost-these oaks or I?
Pass an age or two away,
I must moulder and decay,
But the years that crumble me
Shall invigorate the tree,
Spread its branch, dilate its size,
Lift its summit to the skies.
Cherish honour, virtue, truth,
So shalt thou prolong thy youth.
Wanting these, however fast
Man be fix'd, and form'd to last,
He is lifeless even now,
Stone at heart, and cannot grow.
OF THE LATE JOHN THORNTON, ESQ.
POETS attempt the noblest task they can,
Praising the Author of all good in man ;
And, next, commemorating worthies lost,
The dead in whom that good abounded most.
Thee, therefore, of commercial fame, but more
Famed for thy probity from shore to shore,
Thee, THORNTON! worthy in some page to shine,
As honest, and more eloquent than mine,
I mourn; or, since thrice happy thou must be,
The world, no longer thy abode, not thee.
Thee to deplore, were grief mispent indeed;
It were to weep that goodness has its meed,—
That there is bliss prepared in yonder sky,
And glory for the virtuous, when they die.
What pleasure can the miser's fondled hoard,
Or spendthrift's prodigal excess afford,
Sweet as the privilege of healing woe,
By virtue suffer'd, combating below?
That privilege was thine: Heaven gave
To illumine with delight the saddest scenes,
Till thy appearance chased the gloom, forlorn
As midnight, and despairing of a morn.
Thou hadst an industry in doing good,
Restless as his who toils and sweats for food.
IN MEMORY OF JOHN THORNTON, ESQ.
Avarice, in thee, was the desire of wealth
By rust unperishable, or by stealth;
And if the genuine worth of gold depend
On application to its noblest end,
Thine had a value, in the scales of Heaven,
Surpassing all that mine or mint had given.
And, though God made thee of a nature prone
To distribution boundless of thy own,—
And still, by motives of religious force,
Impell'd thee more to that heroic course,—
Yet was thy liberality discreet,
Nice in its choice, and of a temper'd heat;
And, though in act unwearied, secret still,
As in some solitude the summer rill
Refreshes, where it winds, the faded green,
And cheers the drooping flowers, unheard, unseen.
Such was thy charity; no sudden start, After long sleep, of passion in the heart, But steadfast principle, and, in its kind, Of close relation to the Eternal Mind, Traced easily to its true source above,— To Him, whose works bespeak his nature, Love.
Thy bounties all were Christian, and I make
This record of thee for the Gospel's sake;
That the incredulous themselves may see
Its use and power exemplified in Thee.
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